When Gypo’s eyes found her through the fog, she was hidden to the chin beneath a pile of blankets and clothes of all sorts, up against the wall. She lay on her side, with her white, shrivelled head ensconced in a grey pillow, that had no case to cover it. The feathers protruded from the pillow. The old woman’s white hair was strewn about the pillow and the bedclothes, like strands of seaweed floating on the surface of a shallow sea at low tide. Her mouth was wide open, in an ogreish fashion, displaying red gums and four yellow teeth, cropping up at unequal distances along her jaws; four crooked, yellow fangs.
Her eyes alone showed life and intelligence. They were small, fierce, blue eyes, blazing with cunning and avarice.
Her body, hidden beneath the clothes, resembled a mountain that had been reduced to a shapeless pulp by concussion.
Gypo surveyed her without any emotion. Then he looked around for Katie. He saw her standing in the corner behind the door. She was still dressed as he had met her in the public-house early in the evening. But her dress had become dishevelled. Her face had changed. It had changed in a strange manner. It had lost the careworn, pinched expression. Her eyes were no longer tired. Her face was flushed and full. The skin was loose. The mouth was firm, with a voluptuous softness in the lips. Her eyes flashed bright. They had the calm aggressiveness of healthy, energetic women, who are passing from one success to another, the calm, aggressive flash of satisfied desire and of vaulting ambition. While, in spite of all that, her hands, clutching her throat, trembled in apparent terror, in contradiction to the repose and vitality of her face. Her feet, too, danced spasmodically.
“What’s the matter with ye, Katie?” said Gypo. “What’s that ye were sayin’ about me ghost?”
He spoke in a hoarse, morose whisper.
“God!” exclaimed Katie.
She took her hands away from her throat and clasped them behind her back, with the movement of one offered an objectionable thing. Then she fled to the fire at great speed. She leaned her back against the wall to the right of the fireplace and gaped at Gypo. She motioned to him with her head.
“Shut that door,” she said in a whisper. “Shut the door and come in.”
Gypo turned to the door silently and began to tie the two pieces of broken string to fasten it once more.
“Where haye ye ben?” she whispered. “O, Lord! Ye put the heart crosswise in me.”
Gypo tied the door and stalked slowly and quietly to the hearth. He stood still, glanced towards the old woman and then looked with open lips at Katie.
“They’re after me, Katie,” he muttered with a shudder.
There was a silence. Gypo shuddered again and sat down in front of the fire. He sat on the floor, with his elbows resting on his knees, stretching out his hands to the blaze.
Katie looked at him with glittering eyes. She stood against the wall, motionless. Her face had very white beneath her crumpled red hat. Her eyes glittered. Her upper lip was gathered together, frilled.
The old women in the bed glanced from Gypo to Katie and from Katie to Gypo. Her eyes danced with merriment. She kept cuddling herself, as if in an ecstasy of enjoyment.
“What are ye talkin’ about?” said Katie at length.
“Th’ Organization is after me,” he muttered without looking at her. “Commandant Gallagher is goin’ to plug me. I escaped outa the cell in the Bogey Hole.”
“What are they goin’ to plug ye for? In the name o’ goodness, what are they goin’ to plug ye for?”
Katie Fox’s voice was cold and passionless, but Gypo did not notice. She had a queer, thin smile on her lips, but Gypo did not look at her face. She had a flashing light in her eyes as she spoke, but Gypo had not seen it. He was staring dreamily into the fire. He was tired out and sleepy. There was no use keeping watch any longer. He was tired, tired, tired. Tired and sleepy. What was the use of keeping watch any longer? Sleep, sleep, sleep. Then he would go straight to the south. He would rush to the south with the wind, through all obstacles. Sleep, sleep, sleep.
“It doesn’t matter what they’re after me for,” he muttered.
There was another silence.
Sleep, sleep, sleep.
“They want to get me outa their way,” he mumbled again. “But they’re not goin’ to get me. Katie, I’m goin’ to flop here for the night. I’ll stay till tomorrow night. Then I’m going south. Here’s all the money I have.”
He rummaged in his trousers pocket and brought out on his palm four shillings and sixpence. He handed it to her. She approached and held out her right hand for it, with a mincing movement.
“Gimme that money. Gimme that money,” screamed the old woman from the bed. She struggled to sit up.
“You shut up, Louisa,” growled Gypo, half turning towards her across his shoulder. “Shut up or I’ll flatten ye.”
The old woman collapsed, grinning. Then she caught up a stick that lay beside her in the bed. She shook the stick at Katie Fox.
“She robs me, she robs me,” she wailed, in a thin, cracked voice.
“I’ll sleep here on the floor, Katie,” said Gypo. “Hey, Katie. I’ll sleep here in front o’ the fire. Katie, what’s the matter with ye? Why don’t ye talk to me?” Katie burst into laughter. She had sat down on a low stool to the left of the fire on receiving the money. Now she jumped to her feet and laughed. It was a queer, dry laugh. There was a dreamy look in her eyes. She looked at the floor, wrapped in thought.
“Are ye drunk or what’s
