That girl's face! Devotion;
truth, too, and beauty, rare and moving, in its setting of darkness and
horror, in that nest of vice and of disorder!... The dark archway; the
street arab, with his gleeful: "They 'ain't got 'im yet!"; the feel of
those bare arms round his neck; that whisper of horror in the darkness;
above all, again, her child face looking into his, so truthful! And
suddenly he stood quite still in the street. What in God's name was he
about? What grotesque juggling amongst shadows, what strange and ghastly
eccentricity was all this? The forces of order and routine, all the
actualities of his daily life, marched on him at that moment, and swept
everything before them. It was a dream, a nightmare not real! It was
ridiculous! That he--he should thus be bound up with things so black and
bizarre!
He had come by now to the Strand, that street down which every day he
moved to the Law Courts, to his daily work; his work so dignified and
regular, so irreproachable, and solid. No! The thing was all a monstrous
nightmare! It would go, if he fixed his mind on the familiar objects
around, read the names on the shops, looked at the faces passing.
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