The last flames of sunset over Admiralty Arch lit the peering faces, and they looked as impersonal as gargoyles. Some took off their hats.
“Oh, she’s dead!” sobbed the young lady in the chinchilla coat.
“Such a pretty young lady!” said the taxi-driver bitterly, wiping the blood from his face.
The lean young man and the young policeman knelt beside the still, broken body and tried to find life where no life was. The orange-and-banana merchant took off his hat. The policeman’s helmet fell to the ground and rolled a little way down towards the Strand. The tall fair young man held his silk hat in his hand. The lean young man looked up at him through a blinding mist of tears and stammered: “Aren’t you sorry, aren’t you sorry?”
“George,” sobbed the young lady in the chinchilla coat, “why is he looking at you like that?”
“Blessed if I know!” stammered the tall fair young man.
“By gum, look at the cop!” said the orange-and-banana merchant.
The lean young man darted a look at the policeman kneeling beside him, and he saw that the policeman wept, and he saw that the tip of the policeman’s nose was quivering.
“She died,” stammered the lean young man, “while keeping her promise to you. But you had failed her.”
“I’ve failed at everything in every country,” said the young policeman. “And now I’ll probably get the sack from this job too for crying on my beat.”