Indifferent to all about him, the young man strode on his way through the festive crowds that only the most inclement weather can prevent from promenading Oxford Street on a night in June. He saw nothing, he heard nothing; he was in a great hurry; and it was only as his determined steps were brought almost to a standstill by the great concourse of people about Oxford Circus that his eyes found leisure to examine the placards of the evening journals which were exhibited at the mouth of the Tube Station. “Countess Divorces Husband.” Well, thought he, she couldn’t very well divorce her brother, could she? “Famous Diamond Stolen.” Ah! “Garden Party Thief.” “£2000 Ring Stolen at Society Function.” “Society Hostess Robbed.” It’s almost worth it for her, he thought cattishly, to be called a Society Hostess. And he grinned, and, assuming a fierce expression, which it was not difficult for him to do under the angle of his dilapidated felt hat, he parted the crowds about him and went his way. Maybe it was that the placards had had a stimulating effect on him, or maybe it was that he needed violent exercise, but now he walked even more swiftly than before, oblivious of the remarks which his arrogant passage aroused from the leisurely promenaders.
Soon he turned into a quiet street, and from that into another; and came at last to a large building which, despite the name of Lyonesse Mansions, was a block of flats of the meaner sort. He entered and strode up and up, until the genteel strip of carpet on the stairway gave up all pretence of being a genteel strip of carpet and frankly became a drugget of the consistency of a Gruyère cheese.
To the very top of Lyonesse Mansions strode the cavalier of the streets, and when further progress was barred by a mean-looking door he banged upon that door without restraint, once, twice, thrice; and was then opposed by a feminine person who had all the attributes and mannerisms of a Slut, but was in reality a respectable woman with a vote, the wife of a chauffeur who lived in a neighbouring Mews and whose comforts she increased by doing a bit of charing here and there. She was doing a bit of it here at the moment, and seemed inclined to resent any interruption on behalf of both herself and her employer, for before he had said a word she had snapped “Out,” and only the dexterous shoe of the cavalier of the streets prevented the door from being slammed in his face.
“You’ll get a sore throat if you snarl like that,” he advised her kindly, and pushed past her into the narrow little hall. Thoughtfully, he looked at the three closed doors with which the narrow little hall was decorated; and, by the abstracted expression of his face, seemed to be in a place far removed from the comments on his manners, appearance, and antecedents, if any, which the char-lady, having left the open doorway, poured into his ear.
Then, having thought out his thought, he strode to the middle door and flung it open. The room was dimly lit, which was just as well, for there was in it but one ornament which might have repaid a more exact scrutiny; and that was a girl, who, dressed for solitude in a faded blue peignoir, her fair hair loose about her shoulders, a copy of the Sketch in her hands, lay negligently on a wretched sofa. She was a pretty girl; that has been remarked before; but then she had been dressed like a flower, a flower from a garden sweeter than the spacious garden of Mrs. Felix Waite, and now she was dressed like nothing at all; and the faded blue of her covering was stained by a flat yellow packet of cigarettes. She was obviously no lady, and had given up pretending she was.
“You dirty beast! How dare you come here!” cried the pretty girl, amazement turning to disgust, disgust to anger. But the cavalier of the streets, still framed in the doorway, his head uncovered, only smiled at her. And in his smile there was no hint of apology for the intrusion which his hostess seemed to resent so deeply.
“Good-evening, Betty,” said he, in a friendly way. “Just thought I’d come and look at you, you know. Pretty Betty! You last remarkably well, I must say. How are you, child?” And he advanced into the room, threw his hat on a chair, dug his hands into his pockets, and grinned at her again; while her eyes, pretty blue eyes hardened by despair, stared up at him in helpless anger.
“Michael,” she said bitterly, “you are the world’s worst man. Why can’t you leave me alone?—my Gawd, why can’t you leave me alone?” And as her voice rose, her eyes swept him in utter contempt.
“You poor kid, I have left you alone,” he told her gently, wearily. The fact that the cavalier of the streets had at one time been a gentleman was apparent in the way he took abuse. Abuse made him tired. “I haven’t been near you for years, Betty, so it’s no good your handing me any rough stuff about that....”
His gentleness provoked her. The pretty girl sat up in her disorder, and the expression on her face was not pretty. He smiled curiously, thinking of a very young man up at Magdalen College and of a very pretty girl at a flower-shop near the station, and how the young man had loved the pretty girl from a distance, until one day he had realised that the pretty girl was very willing to be loved by him; whereupon she had got the sack from the flower-shop, and had come up to London for to be a chorus-girl, and in due course the young man had forgotten her....