The policeman again passed by, and this time eyed him askance. Why was he sitting on those steps? A suspicion of felonious purpose relieved the monotony of his beat.
“You ’ll be moving on soon,” he said. “You mustn’t doss on them doorsteps all day.”
The man looked at him rather stupidly. His first impulse was one of servile obedience—an instinct of late habit, and he rose from his seat. Then his sense of independence asserted itself, and he said, in a somewhat defiant tone:—
“I felt faint from the heat. You have no right to molest me.”
The policeman glanced at him from head to foot. A gentleman evidently, in spite of well-worn clothes and gloveless hands thrust into trousers pockets. He wore no watch-chain, and his shirt-cuffs were destitute of links. “Down upon his luck,” thought the policeman; “ill too.” The man’s face was pinched, and of the transparent white of a thin, fair man with delicately cut features. His eyes were heavy, deeply sunken, and wore an expression of weariness mingled with fear. The side muscles by his mouth were relaxed, as if a heavy drooping moustache had dragged them down; the scanty blonde hair on his upper lip, curled up at the ends, contrasted oddly with this impression. He looked careworn and ill. His clothes hung loosely upon him. The policeman surrendered his point.
“Well, you ain’t obstructing the traffic,” he replied good-humouredly; and again he left the man alone, who reseated himself on the shady steps, as if disinclined to stir from comfortable quarters. But the spell of his meditations had been broken. He leaned his head against the stone pillar of the balustrade and tried to think of occupation for the day. He longed for to-morrow, when he could resume his weary search for work, interrupted since Saturday noon. At first he had plunged into the hopeless task with feverish anxiety, humiliated by rebuffs, agonised through the frustration of idle hopes. Now it had grown mechanical, a daily routine, devoid of pain or joy, to drag himself through the busy streets from office to office and from shop to shop. He resented the Sunday cessation of work, as interfering with the tenor of his life. This Bank Holiday added another Sunday to the week.
The heat and glare and soundless solitude of the street made him drowsy. The thought of death passed through him: an euthanasia—to fade there peacefully out of existence. And then to be picked up dead on a doorstep—a fitting end. Finis coronat opus. He sniffed cynically at the idea. The minutes passed. The shade gradually encroached upon the sunlight of the pavement. A cat from one of the great deserted houses drew near with meditative step, smelt his boots, and, in the bored manner of her tribe, curled herself up to slumber. A butcher’s cart rattling past awoke the man, and he bent down and stroked the creature at his feet. Then he became aware of a figure approaching him, along the pavement—a tiny woman, neatly dressed. He watched her idly, with lack-lustre gaze. But when she came within distance of salutation, their eyes met, and each started in recognition. He rose hurriedly and made a step as if to cross the road, but the little lady stopped still.
“Stephen Chisely!”
She moved forward and laid a detaining touch upon his arm, and looked up questioningly into his face:—
“Won’t you speak to me?”