've got the 'Curse of a Crook' on
up the street. Fairly mike yer 'air curl."

"I want noise," said Jay, "a much louder noise than that old piano. The
pictures are so horribly quiet. Just an underfed man turning a handle,
and an underfed woman hitting an underfed piano. At a play you can at
least pretend that the actors are having a little fun too, but the
pictures--there's only two sad people without smiles at the bottom of it
all. I won't go to the pictures, I'll go and get drunk."

"Come on then," said Mrs. Love. "You won't find no lost friends there,
but come on. I'll be yer pal for to-night. You've been a pal to me before
now. We're temp'ary pals right enough, there' ain't no permanent kind.
You won't find no shivers straying around in the ole Cross'n Beetle.
Let's 'urry, an' get drunk, and keep 'and in 'and all the time. That's
wot pals oughter do."

Jay suddenly saw the whole world as a thing running away from its
thoughts. The crowd that filled the pavement was fugitive, and every man
felt the hot breath of fear on the back of his neck. One only used one's
voice for the drowning of one's thoughts; one only used one's feet for
running away. The whole world was in flight along the endless streets,
and the lucky ones were in trams and donkey carts that they might flee
the faster.

"Hurry, hurry," said Jay. And she and little Mrs. Love ran hand in hand.

The Chap from the Top Floor and Mrs. 'Ero Edwards were already leading
society in the Cross'n Beetle when Jay and Mrs. Love reached it. The
barman knew Mrs. Edwards too well to think that she was drunk already,
but you or I, transported suddenly thither, would have supposed that her
beano was over instead of yet to come.

"'Elbert," said Mrs. 'Ero Edwards, "yo're an 'Un, yo're an internal
alien, thet's what's the metter with you. I wonder I 'aven't blacked yer
eye for you many a time and oft."

There was almost enough noise even for Jay, and she and Mrs. Love, each
armed with a generously topped glass, sat in the background, on the
shiny seat that lined the wall.

To Jay this evening was an experiment, an experiment born of weariness of
a well-worn road. She watched Mrs. Love blow some of the superfluous
froth on to the floor, and did likewise. Directly she had put her lips to
the thick brim of her glass she knew that here was the stuff of which
certain dreams are made.

She had, I suppose, the weakest head in the world, and in three minutes
she was giddy