And at last he spoke.
"No," he said slowly. "I don't mind even that. I don't care--even if
it was that."
Abruptly they turned into the King's Road, with its roar of wheeled
traffic and hurrying foot-passengers, and forthwith a crowd of boys
with a broken-spirited Guy involved and separated them. In a busy
highway of a night one must needs talk disconnectedly in shouted
snatches or else hold one's peace. He glanced at her face and saw that
it was set again. Presently she turned southward out of the tumult
into a street of darkness and warm blinds, and they could go on
talking again.
"I understand what you mean," said Lewisham. "I know I do. You knew,
but you did not want to know. It was like that."
But her mind had been active. "At the end of this road," she said,
gulping a sob, "you must go back. It was kind of you to come,
Mr. Lewisham. But you were ashamed--you are sure to be ashamed. My
employer is a spiritualist, and my stepfather is a professional
Medium, and my mother is a spiritualist. You were quite right not to
speak to me last night. Quite. It was kind of you to come, but you
must go back. Life is hard enough as it is ... You must go back at the
end of the road. Go back at the end of the road ..."
Lewisham made no reply for a hundred yards.
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