and grey experiences, but he has nothing of Gissing's almost
perverse gloom and despondency. Indeed he is as gay a companion as he is
fragile. He is a twinkling addition to any Christmas party, and the
twinkle is here in the style. And having sported with him "in his times
of happy infancy," I add an intimate and personal satisfaction to my
pleasant task of saluting this fine work that ends a brilliant
apprenticeship and ranks Swinnerton as Master. This is a book that will
not die. It is perfect, authentic, and alive. Whether a large and
immediate popularity will fall to it I cannot say, but certainly the
discriminating will find it and keep it and keep it alive. If Mr.
Swinnerton were never to write another word I think he might count on
this much of his work living, as much of the work of Mary Austen, W.H.
Hudson, and Stephen Crane will live, when many of the more portentous
reputations of to-day may have served their purpose in the world and
become no more than fading names.

DECEMBER, 1917

CONTENTS

PART ONE: EVENING

CHAPTER

I. SIX O'CLOCK

II. THE TREAT

III. ROWS

IV. THE WISH

PART TWO: NIGHT

V. THE ADVENTURE

VI. THE YACHT

VII. MORTALS

VIII. PENALTIES

IX. WHAT FOLLOWED

X. CINDERELLA

PART THREE: MORNING

XI. AFTER THE THEATRE

XII. CONSEQUENCES

PART ONE

EVENING

CHAPTER I: SIX O'CLOCK

i

Six o'clock was striking. The darkness by Westminster Bridge was
intense; and as the tramcar turned the corner from the Embankment Jenny
craned to look at the thickly running water below. The glistening of
reflected lights which spotted the surface of the Thames gave its rapid
current an air of such mysterious and especially sinister power that she
was for an instant aware of almost uncontrollable terror. She could feel
her heart beating, yet she could not withdraw her gaze. It was nothing:
no danger threatened Jenny but the danger of uneventful life; and her
sense of sudden yielding to unknown force was the merest fancy, to be
quickly forgotten when the occasion had passed. None the less, for that
instant her dread was breathless. It was the fear of one who walks in a
wood, at an inexplicable rustle. The darkness and the sense of moving
water continued to fascinate her, and she slightly shuddered, not at a
thought, but at the sensation of the moment. At last she closed her
eyes, still, however, to