She did not seem to be even aware of the people who stared
at her. When he was almost out of hearing, she added:
"Give him my love!" shrilly, vindictively, as though it had been a final
insult. But he took no notice and now, at any rate, she was crying
bitterly enough.
2
"E" proved to be the top room of No. 10, a dingy lodging-house whose
front door, in accordance with the uncertain habits of its patrons, stood
open from year's end to year's end. Robert went in unnoticed. He ran up
the steep, narrow stairs, with their tattered carpeting, two steps at a
time. A queer elation surged beneath his anger and distress. Cosgrave's
failure was like a personal challenge--a defiance thrown in his teeth.
The old fight was on again. It was against odds. But then, he had
always fought against odds--won against them.
The room was Connie Edwards herself. It seemed to rush out at him in a
tearing rage, flaunting its vulgar finery and its odour of bad scent and
cheap cigarette smoke. It made him sick, and he brushed it out of his
consciousness. He did not see the poor attempts to make it decent and
attractive--the bed disguised beneath a faded Liberty cretonne, a
sentimental Christ hanging between a galaxy of matinee heroes, nor a
full-length woman's portrait, across which was scrawled "Gyp Labelle" in
letters large enough to conceal half of her outrageous nakedness. There
were even a few flowers, drooping forlornly out of a dusty vase, and a
collection of theatrical posters, to lend a touch, of serious
professionalism.
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