g of the glorious future awaiting him if his tragedy was a
success, or perhaps he was dejected. After so many disappointments what
ground had he for hope? Lavinia longed to whisper in his ear words of
encouragement. She had treasured that look when his face lighted up at
something she had said that had pleased him. And his sadness she
remembered too. She was really inclined to think she liked him better
when he was sad than when he was joyful. But this was because she
gloried in chasing that sadness away. It was a tribute to her power of
witchery.

Dusk was creeping on. She must not remain longer in that solitary
expanse. She rose and sped towards Charing Cross. In the Strand citizens
and their wives, apprentices and their lasses were taking the air. The
scraps of talk, the laughter, gave her a sense of security. But the
problem of how to pass the night was still before her. She dared not
linger to think it out. She must go on. Young gallants gorgeously
arrayed were swaggering arm in arm in pursuit of adventure, in plain
words in pursuit of women, the prettier the better. Lavinia had
scornfully repelled the advances of more than one and to loiter would
but invite further unwelcome attention.

The night was come but fortunately the sky was clear, for the Strand was
ill lighted. St. Mary's Church, not long since consecrated, St.
Clement's Church, loomed large and shadowy in the narrow roadway,
narrowing still more towards Temple Bar past the ill-favoured and
unsavoury Butcher's Row on the north side of the street, where the
houses of rotting plaster and timber with overhanging storeys frowned
upon the passer-by and suggested deeds of violence and robbery.

Butcher's Row and its evil reputation, even the ruffians and dissolute
men lurking in the deep doorways did not frighten Lavinia so much as the
silk-coated and bewigged cavaliers. The days of the Mohocks were gone it
was true, but lawlessness still remained.

Lavinia was perfectly conscious that she was being followed by a spark
of this class. She did not dare look round lest he should think she
encouraged him, but she knew all the same that he was keeping on her
heels. Along Fleet Street he kept close to her and on Ludgate Bridge
where the traffic was blocked by the crowd gazing into the Fleet river
at some urchin's paddling in the muddy stream he spoke to her. She
hadn't the least idea what he said, she was too terrified.

In the darkness of St. Paul's Churchyard