at leisure to look while she babbled, I found my carnal mind reversed on appeal. She was certainly not a pretty girl from the standpoint of a music-hall audience. There was something indefinably Mongolian about her face. The planes were flat ; the cheek-bones high ; the eyes oblique ; the nose wide, short, and vital; the mouth a long, thin, rippling curve like a mad sunset. The eyes were tiny and green, with a piquant elfin expression. Her hair was curiously colourless ; it was very abundant; she had wound great ropes about her head. It reminded me of the armature of a dynamo. It produced a weird effectthis mingling of the savage Mongol with the savage Norseman type. Her strange hair fascinated me. It was that delicate flaxen hue, so fine-no, I don't know how to tell you about it, I can't think of it without getting all muddled up.
One wondered how she was there. One saw at a glance that she didn't belong to that set. Refinement, aristocracy almost, were like a radiance about her tiniest gesture. She had no affectation about being an artist. She happened to like these people in exactly the same way as a Methodist old maid in Balharn might take an interest in natives of Tonga, and so she went about with them. Her mother didn't mind. Probably, too, the way things are nowadays, her mother didn't matter.
You mustn't think that we were any of us drunk, except old Owen. As a matter of fact, all I had had was a glass of white wine. Lou had touched nothing at all. She prattled on like the innocent child she was, out of the sheer mirth of her heart. In an ordinary way, I suppose, I should have drunk a lot more than I did. And I didn't eat much either. Of course, I know now what it was-that much-derided phenomenon, love at first sight.
Suddenly we were interrupted. A tall man was shaking hands across the table with Owen. Instead of using any of the ordinary greetings, he said in a very low, clear voice, very clear and vibrant, as though tense with some inscrutable passion:
"Do what thou wilt shall be the whole of the Law."
There was an uneasy movement in the group. In particular, the German woman seemed distressed by the man's mere presence.
I looked up. Yes, I could understand well enough the change in the weather. Owen was saying
" That's all right, that's all right, that's exactly what I do. You come and see my new group. I'll do another sketch of you-same day, same time. That's all right."
Somebody introduced the new-comer-Mr. King Lamus-and murmured our names.
" Sit down right here," said Owen, " what you need is a drink. I know you perfectly well; I've known you for years and years and years, and I know you've done a good day's work, and you've earned a drink. Sit right down and I'll get the waiter."
I looked at Lamus, who had not uttered a word since his original greeting. There was something appalling in his eyes ; they didn't focus on the foreground. I was only an incident of utter insignificance in an illimitable landscape. His eyes were parallel; they were looking at infinity. Nothing mattered to him. I hated the beast !
By this time the waiter had approached. " Sorry, sir," he said to Owen, who had ordered a '65 brandy.
It appeared that it was now eight hours forty-three minutes thirteen and three-fifth seconds past noon. I don't know what the law is; nobody in England knows what the law is-not even the fools that make the laws. We are not under the laws and do not enjoy the liberties which our fathers bequeathed us; we are under a complex and fantastic system of police administration nearly as pernicious as anything even in America.
" Don't apologise," said Lamus to the waiter in a tone of icy detachment. " This is the freedom we fought for."
I was entirely on the side of the speaker. I hadn't wanted a drink all evening, but now I was told I couldn't have one, I wanted to raid their damn cellars and fight the Metropolitan Police and go up in my 'plane and drop a few bombs on the silly old House of Commons. And yet I was in no sort of sympathy with the man. The contempt of his tone irritated me. He was in-human, somehow; that was what antagonised me.
He turned to Owen. " Better come round to my studio," he drawled; I have a machine gun trained on Scotland Yard." Owen rose with alacrity.
" I shall be delighted to see any of you others," continued Lamus. " I should deplore it to the day of my death if I were the innocent means of breaking up so perfect a party."
The invitation sounded like an insult. I went red behind the ears; I could only just command myself enough to make a formal apology of some sort.
As a matter of fact, there was a very curious reaction in the whole party. The German Jew got up at oncenobody else stirred. Rage boiled in my heart. I understood instantly what had taken place. The intervention of Lamus had automatically divided the party into giants and dwarfs ; and I was one of the dwarfs.
During the dinner, Mrs. Webster, the German woman, had spoken hardly at all. But as soon as the three men had turned their backs, she remarked acidly:
" I don't think we're dependent for our drinks on Mr. King Lamus. Let's go round to the Smoking Dog."
Everybody agreed with alacrity. The suggestion seemed to have relieved the unspoken tension.
We found ourselves in taxis, which for some in-scrutable reason are still allowed to ply practically unchecked in the streets of London. While eating and breathing and going about are permitted, we shall never be a really righteous race !
Chapter II.
Over the Top!
It was only about a quarter of an hour before we reached " The Dog " ; but the time passed heavily. I had been annexed by the white maggot. Her presence made me feel as if I were already a corpse. It was the limit.
But I think the ordeal served to bring up in my mind some inkling of the true nature of my feeling for Lou.
The Smoking Dog, now ingloriously extinct, was a night club decorated by a horrible little cad who spent his life pushing himself into art and literature. The dancing room was a ridiculous, meaningless, gaudy, bad imitation of Klimmt.
Damn it all, I may not be a great flyer, but I am a fresh-air man. I detest these near-artists with their poses and their humbug and their swank. I hate shams.
I found myself in a state of furious impatience before five minutes had passed. Mrs. Webster and Lou had not arrived. Ten minutes-twenty-I fell into a blind rage, drank heavily of the vile liquor with which the place was stinking, and flung myself with I don't know what woman into the dance.
A shrill-voiced Danish siren, the proprietress, was screaming abuse at one of her professional entertainers -some long, sordid, silly story of sexual jealousy, I suppose. The band was deafening. The fine edge of my sense was dulled. It was in a sort of hot nightmare that I saw, through the smoke and the stink of the club, the evil smile of Mrs. Webster.
Small as the woman was, she seemed to fill the doorway. She preoccupied the attention in the same way as a snake would have done. She saw me at once, and ran almost into my arms excitedly. She whispered something in my ear. I didn't hear it.
The club had suddenly been, so to speak, struck dumb. Lou was coming through the door. Over her shoulders was an opera cloak of deep rich purple edged with gold, the garment of an empress, or (shall I say ?) of a priestess.
The whole place stopped still to look
