in these days. I do believe there are more banks than A.B.C. shops and Lyonses. You look at any nice corner site, and before you can say knife there's a bank on it. I mistrust those banks. They do what they like. When I go into my bank somehow they make me feel as if I'd done something wrong, or at least, I'd better mind what I was about; and they look at you superior as if you were asking a favour. Oh, very polite! But so condescending."
A shrewd woman! A woman certainly not without ideas! And he perceived, dimly through the veil of his physical pain, that their intimacy was developing on the right lines. He would have been joyous, but for the apprehension of her selling the business and vanishing from him, and but for the pain. The latter was now the worst affliction. Riceyman Steps seemed a thousand miles off, through a Sabbath-enchanted desert of stone and asphalt.
When they returned into St. John's Square a taxi-cab with its flag up stood terribly inviting. Paradise, surcease from agony, for one shilling and perhaps a two-penny tip! But he would not look at it. He could not. He preferred the hell in which he was. The grand passion which had rendered all his career magnificent, and every hour of all his days interesting and beautiful, demanded and received an intense, devotional loyalty; it recompensed him for every ordeal, mortification, martyrdom. He proudly passed the taxicab with death in his very stomach. Nowhere was there a chance of rest! Not a seat! Not a rail! Mrs. Arb had inveighed against the lack of amenities in the parish and district. No cinemas, no theatre, no music-halls, no cafes! But Mr. Earlforward realized the ruthless, stony, total inhospitality of the district far more fully than Mrs. Arb could ever have done. He was like a weakening bird out of sight of land above the surface of the ocean.
He led Mrs. Arb down towards the nearest point of Farringdon Road, though this was not the shortest way home. The tramcars stopped at the corner. Every one of them would deposit him at his own door. Paradise for one penny! No, twopence; because he would have to pay for Mrs. Arb! He had thought to defeat his passion at this corner. He was mistaken. He could not. He had, after all his experience, misjudged the power of his passion. He was as helpless as the creatures who were beginning to gather at the iron-barred doors of the public-houses, soon to open for a couple of too short hours; and also he had the secret ecstasy which they had. He could scarcely talk now, and each tram that passed him in his slow and endless march gave him a spasm of mingled bitterness and triumph. His fear now was lest his grand passion should on this occasion be overcome by bodily weakness. He did not desire it to be overcome. He desired it to conquer even if it should kill him.
"I'm afraid I've walked you too far," said Mrs. Arb.
"Why?"
"I thought you were limping a bit."
"Oh no! I always limp a bit. Accident. Long time ago." And he smartened his gait.
They reached Riceyman Steps in silence. He had done it! His passion had forced him to do it! His passion had won! There were two Mr. Earlforward's: one splendidly uplifted, the other ready to faint from pain and fatigue. The friends disappeared, each into the solitude of his own establishment. In the afternoon Mr. Earlforward heard a sharp knock on his front-door; it was repeated before he could get downstairs; and when he opened the door he opened it to nobody; but Mrs. Arb was just entering her shop. He called out, and she returned.
"I was a bit anxious about your leg," she said, so brightly and kindly, "so I thought I'd step across and inquire."
"Quite all right again, now, thank you." (An exaggeration.)
How delightful of her! How feminine! He could hardly believe it! He was tremendously flattered. She could not after all slip through his fingers, whatever happened! They chatted for a few moments, and then each disappeared a second time into the recondite, inviolate solitude of his own establishment.
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