VIII
In the glance which Paul gave Flamby there was something odic and strange. He experienced a consciousness of giving and a consciousness of loss. Flamby was aware of intense shame and mad joy. She threw her arm over her bare shoulder to hide it and shrank back against the door not daring to raise her eyes again. She was trembling violently. Beneath her downcast lashes she could see the door of Chauvin's studio, and suddenly she determined to fly there for shelter, as had been her original intention. She started—but Paul held her fast. Flamby hid her face against his coat.
"Flamby—who has done this?" Paul's voice was very low and very steady.
Flamby swallowed emotionally, but already her quick wit was at work again and she realised that Paul must be prevented from entering James's studio, must be spared a sight of the picture which lay upon the floor. "We were—just ragging," she said tremulously, "and it got too rough. So I—ran out My dress is torn, you see." She did not look up. Paul's Harris tweed coat had a faint odour of peat and tobacco. She realised that she was clutching him for support.
He was carrying a light Burberry on his arm, and he held it open for her. "Slip this on, Flamby," he said, in the same low, steady voice, "and sit there on the ledge for a moment." He helped her to put on the coat, which enveloped her grotesquely, led her to the low parapet which surrounded the figure of the dancing faun and stepped toward the door of James's studio.
Flamby leapt up and clutched his arm with both hands. "No, no!" she cried. "You must not go in there! Oh, please listen to me! I don't want you to go in."
Paul half turned, looking down at her. "Don't excite yourself, Flamby. I shall not be a moment."
But she clutched him persistently until, looking swiftly up at him, she saw the pallor of his olive skin and the expression in his eyes. She allowed him to unlock her fingers from his arm and she dropped down weakly on to the narrow stone ledge as he crossed to the studio door. It was very still in the courtyard. Some sparrows were chirping up on a roof, but the sounds of the highroad were muted and dim. Paul grasped the brass handle and sought to turn it. As he did so Flamby realised that James had bolted the door. Paul stood for a moment looking at the massive oak and then turned away, rejoining Flamby. "Come along to Chauvin's," he said. "I will get a cab for you."
The only occupant of Chauvin's studio was a romantic-looking man wearing a very dirty smock, a man who looked like an illustration for La Vie de Bohème, so that a stranger must have mistaken him for a celebrated artist although he actually combined the duties of a concierge with those of a charwoman. He displayed no surprise when Flamby came in, wild-haired, arrayed in Paul's Burberry.
"See if you can get a taxi, Martin," said Flamby, dropping into a huge Jacobean arm-chair over which a purple cloak was draped. A King Charles spaniel who had been asleep on a cushion awoke immediately and jumped on to her knees. Flamby caressed the little animal, looking down at his snub-nosed face intently. Paul walked up and down the studio. He began speaking in a low voice.