“You’re a cynic,” he said. “You’ve no illusions. You see all women in the same pattern. I’m twice your age and look at me—the happiest man alive.”
“Perhaps I’ve been unlucky,” I said. “Maybe I’ve struck the wrong type.”
“Ah!” he said, “a bad picker. That’s fatal. I flatter myself,” he opened his mouth to admit a fork-load of food, “that I have chosen well. You young men are so bitter about life,” he went on, “no romance.”
Romance! The word conjured a vision in my mind of a dark night with the rain falling, and a small face turned to me, weeping, her hat pulled low over her eyes. The last taxi driving away from the Empire Cinema; men and women in evening dress, hurrying, bent under umbrellas.
“Romance!” I said. “That’s funny.” Funnier still the way I caught hold of that one word. It would have been so easy to let it go.
I thought for a moment, turning it over in my head.
“The last time I heard that word,” I said, “was from the lips of a girl. I’m not likely to forget it in a hurry.”
He glanced at me enquiringly, surprised at the note in my voice.
“More bitterness?” he suggested. “Why don’t you tell me about it? You’re such a silent fellow you never give yourself away.”
“Oh! It’s a dull story,” I said, “scarcely worth listening to! Besides, you’re going to be married in an hour’s time.”
“Come on,” he laughed, “out with it.”
I shrugged my shoulders, yawning slightly, and reached for a cigarette.
“I ran up against her in Wardour Street,” I said. “Queer sort of place for an adventure, if you come to think of it. Almost too obvious, perhaps. It’s scarcely a beat of mine, anyway. I’m a retiring sort of chap, as you know, don’t go out much. Hate meeting people, and that kind of thing. Never go to theatres, never go to parties. Can’t afford it, for that matter. My life is spent between the office down in the City and my rooms in Kensington. I read a lot, hang around museums on Saturdays. Let’s admit it, I’m damn dull! But the point is that I scarcely know the West End at all. So that this particular Wardour Street was unfamiliar to me. About six months ago I came back from the office one evening feeling fed to the world. You know how one gets—nervy, irritable, thoroughly dissatisfied with life in general.
“I hated my rooms suddenly, and I felt that any minute my landlady would come in and tell me about her sister who was ‘expecting’ again. It occurred to me out of the blue then, this idea to go up West. I took the Tube to Leicester Square. When I came into the street I had a glance at the photographs hanging outside the Hippodrome, but I saw by the boards that the show had already begun. So I walked a little farther, and I came to the Empire. I loathe cinemas, never go inside ’em as a rule, but I was feeling so down and depressed that [ said to myself, “Why not?” and I went inside, paying my humble two and fourpence, with a slight sensation of shame. Have you ever been to the Empire? In the old days, naturally, but since they’ve turned it into a cinema? Well, let me tell you that the chap who owns that place is a genius. He caters for fools like me who are fed up with the office, and their lodgings, and their loneliness. There are seats especially made for tired backs and the lighting arrangements are sufficiently intriguing, and the darkness is even more intriguing.
“There’s an organ that throbs a sentimental tune, and when you’re soaked with this and rubbing knees with your next-door neighbour, they fling a picture on to the screen calculated to send you soft inside. That night I was in the right mood. Ready to absorb the utmost trash and be diluted with it. They kept on giving closeups of the blonde heroine; she seemed to be staring right at me. The usual theme, of course. Lovely innocent girl in love with handsome hero, and the dark blackguard stepping in and trying to ruin her. You’re kept on tenterhooks as to whether he ruins her or whether he doesn’t. He doesn’t, of course, and she finishes with the handsome hero. But even then it leaves you unsatisfied. No real love scenes for your money—only a caption saying, ‘Then Came the Dawn!’ The show at the Empire goes on until midnight. I sat through it twice, and stumbled out of my seat at twelve o’clock, still living in a land of make-believe.
“When I got outside it was raining. Through a haze I saw people crouching under umbrellas, whisking into taxis. I saw all this as a dream, in my mind I was watching the blonde heroine shut the opening of that tent in the desert. … ‘Then Came the Dawn.’ ‘B⸺ rot,’ I said to myself, and turning up my collar I began to walk, my head low, hating the rain.
“So I found myself in Wardour Street. I remember glancing up at the name on the corner. A few minutes later somebody bumped into me. It was a girl. Thinly dressed, I noticed, not carrying an umbrella.
“ ‘I beg your pardon,’ I said. She looked up at me, a little white face under a hat pulled low over her brow. Then to my horror she burst into tears.
“ ‘I’m most frightfully sorry,’ I began, ‘have I hurt you? Is there anything I can do?’ She made as if to brush past me, and put her hands to her eyes.
“ ‘It’s nothing,’ she said, choking over her words, ‘it was stupid of me.’ She looked to the right and left, standing on the edge of the pavement, apparently in some hesitation as to which way she
