Part 42 (1/2)
He insisted on getting and helping her into her coat. As she put her arms into the sleeves, he murmured:
”Where did you get your hair?”
”Do try and talk sense,” she pleaded, not insensible to the man's ardent admiration.
Then, with something like a sigh, she left the warmth and comfort of the restaurant for the bleakness of the street, on which a thick fog had descended.
This enveloped the man and the woman. As they stood on the pavement, it seemed to cut them off from the rest of the world.
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
THE SEQUEL
”Will you let me drive you home?”
”No, thank you.”
”Then you must let me walk with you.”
”There's no necessity.”
”I insist. London, at this time of night, isn't the place for a plain little girl like Mavis.”
”Now you're talking sense.”
”I wish I thought it,” he remarked bitterly.
He paid the cabman and piloted Mavis through the fog to the other side of Regent Street; they then made for Piccadilly.
”Am I going right?” he asked.
”At present,” she replied, to ask, after a moment or two, ”Why are you so extravagant?”
”I'm not.”
”That supper and keeping that cab waiting! It must have run into pounds.”
”Eh! What if it did?”
”It's wicked. Just think of the good you could have done with it.”
”Good? Who to?” he asked blankly.
”You've only to look about you. Don't you know of all the misery there is in the world?”
”To tell you the truth, I've never thought very much about it.”
”Then you ought to.”