I might have guessed that.'
They passed Victoria Station, and came into Horseferry Road. She had
informed him that she had taken a furnished room in Horseferry Road. The
high and sinister houses appeared unspeakably and disgracefully mean to
him in the wintry gloom of the gaslights. She halted before a tenement
that seemed even more odious than its neighbours. Was it possible that
she should exist in such a quarter? The idea sickened him.
'Which floor?' he questioned.
'Oh,' she laughed, 'the top, the fifth. Good-night, Mr. Hugo.'
He pictured the mean and frowsy room, and shuddered. Yet what could he
do? What right had he to interfere, to criticise, to ameliorate?
'Good-night,' she repeated, and in a moment she had opened the door with
a latchkey and disappeared. He stood staring at the door. He had by no
means finished saying all that he meant to say to her. He must talk to
her further. He must show her that he could not be dismissed in that
summary fashion. He mounted the two dirty steps, and rang the bell in a
determined manner. He heard it tinkle distantly.
She was divine, adorable, marvellous, and far beyond the deserts of any
man; but she had not shaken hands with him, and she had treated him as
she might have treated one of the shopwalkers.
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