"That's Mr. Ripley," said the young woman. "He's often out at night. He's a oner, he is. Down to Brighton and back and all that, you know."
René did not know, but he was pleased and excited. London had ceased to be a spectacle to him. He had been drawn into an adventure, taken to a place where people lived--and a very strange place--the friendliest of hands was on his arm, the cheeriest of voices ringing in his ears.
Do not her dark eyes tell thee thou art not despised? The Heaven's messenger! All Heaven's blessings be hers.
"I'M sorry," she said, "but you'll have to help me upstairs. Wasn't I a fool to go and get tripped up like that?--O-o-h! Hercules!"
René took her in his arms and carried her up the narrow little stairs. She opened the door and asked him to come in and have a cup of tea. After she had put the kettle on and lit the gas she sat and took a long look at him.
"I like you," she said. "And I suppose I shan't see you again. That's always the way. The people you like best you see only once, or in the train, or going by in a bus. Is it far where you live?"
"It's true. I've only just come to London. This morning."
She shrugged her amazement away, his adventures being no business of hers.
After she had made the tea she removed her shoes and stockings and examined her ankle. It was inflamed and slightly swollen. She made him rub it, giving little gasps as he touched or wrenched the soreness.
"'Tisn't a sprain? You don't think it's a sprain? I don't care as long as it isn't a sprain."
"No, I shouldn't think it's a sprain; but you'd better ask someone else."
She looked unhappy and uncomfortable for a moment. Then she said:
"I shouldn't have thought it. You look so young. What did you do?"
"Lectured and took pupils at the university."
"College? I know. There's a big school just round here. I suppose it's something like that. I seen the teachers. Half-baked they look, some of them. Was that it?"
"I don't know what it was. Things came to a head suddenly. I was taken by surprise. I think it will take me some time to realize quite what has happened."
She asked his name. He gave it and she hers, Ann Pidduck, and she worked in a factory, pickles and condiments, at the packing, putting wooden boxes together with a machine that drove in four nails at a time. Once she had been ill and sent away and taught the artificial flowers, and she did that too, in her spare time, for some hat-shops in the High Street, and for one or two ladies she knew. She used to live at home with her mother, who had turned religious and couldn't put up with a bit of fun. And she had a friend who lived in these rooms when there were still horses in the mews, but the friend had gone out to Canada on a farm, "where you get married at once if you're anything like." She broke off her story: