yer a bit more,
yer know. I s'll 'ave to make a bit out of it. _I'm_ partikler as a
rule. I don't like 'em comin' in an' goin' out, you know. Things get
said. You look so quiet, you do. Come now, it's worth a hextra quart
to me, else I shan't have it, I shan't. You can't make as free as
all that with the house, you know, be it what it may--"

She stood red-faced and dour in the doorway. Alvina quietly gave her
half-a-sovereign.

"Nay, lass," said the woman, "if you share niver a drop o' th'
lashins, you mun split it. Five shillin's is oceans, ma wench. I'm
not down on you--not me. On'y we've got to keep up appearances a
bit, you know. Dash my rags, it's a caution!"

"I haven't got five shillings--" said Alvina.

"Yer've not? All right, gi'e 's ha 'efcrown today, an' t'other
termorrer. It'll keep, it'll keep. God bless you for a good wench.
A' open 'eart 's worth all your bum-righteousness. It is for me. An'
a sight more. You're all right, ma wench, you're all right--"

And the rather bleary woman went nodding away.

Alvina ought to have minded. But she didn't. She even laughed into
her ricketty mirror. At the back of her thoughts, all she minded was
that Ciccio did not pay her some attention. She really expected him
now to come to speak to her. If she could have imagined how far he
was from any such intention.

So she loitered unwillingly at her window high over the grey, hard,
cobbled street, and saw her landlady hastening along the black
asphalt pavement, her dirty apron thrown discreetly over what was
most obviously a quart jug. She followed the squat, intent figure
with her eye, to the public-house at the corner. And then she saw
Ciccio humped over his yellow bicycle, going for a steep and
perilous ride with Gigi.

Still she lingered in her sordid room. She could feel Madame was
expecting her. But she felt inert, weak, incommunicative. Only a
real fear of offending Madame drove her down at last.

Max opened the door to let her in.

"Ah!" he said. "You've come. We were wondering about you."

"Thank you," she said, as she passed into the dirty hall where still
two bicycles stood.

"Madame is in the kitchen," he said.

Alvina found Madame trussed in a large white apron, busy rubbing a
yellow-fleshed hen with lemon, previous to boiling.

"Ah!" said Madame. "So there you are! I have been out and done my
shopping, and already begun to prepare the dinner. Yes, you may help
me. Can you wash leeks? Yes? E