large palms, peering at her in a business-like way till he heard her say faintly `Mr Ossipon!' and then he very nearly let her drop to the ground.

`Mrs Verloc!' he exclaimed. `You here!'

It seemed impossible to him that she should have been drinking. But one never knows. He did not go into that question, but attentive not to discourage kind fate surrendering to him the widow of Comrade Verloc, he tried to draw her to his breast. To his astonishment she came quite easily, and even rested on his arm for a moment before she attempted to disengage herself. Comrade Ossipon would not be brusque with kind fate. He withdrew his arm in a natural way.

`You recognized me,' she faltered out, standing before him, fairly steady on her legs.

`Of course I did,' said Ossipon with perfect readiness. `I was afraid you were going to fall. I've thought of you too often lately not to recognize you anywhere, at any time. I've always thought of you - ever since I first set eyes on you. Mrs Verloc seemed not to hear. `You were coming to the shop?' she said, nervously.

`Yes; at once,' answered Ossipon. `Directly I read the paper.'

In fact, Comrade Ossipon had been skulking for a good two hours in the neighbourhood of Brett Street, unable to make up his mind for a bold move. The robust anarchist was not exactly a bold conqueror. He remembered that Mrs Verloc had never responded to his glances by the slightest sign of encouragement. Besides, he thought the shop might be watched by the police, and Comrade Ossipon did not wish the police to form an exaggerated notion of his revolutionary sympathies. Even now he did not know precisely what to do. In comparison with his usual amatory speculations this was a big and serious undertaking. He ignored how much there was in it and how far he would have to go in order to get hold of what there was to get - supposing there was a chance at all. These perplexities checking his elation imparted to his tone a soberness well in keeping with the circumstances.

`May I ask you where you were going?' he inquired in a subdued voice.

`Don't ask me!' cried Mrs Verloc with a shuddering, repressed violence. All her strong vitality recoiled from the idea of death. `Never mind where 1 was going... '

Ossipon concluded that she was very much excited but perfectly sober. She remained silent by his side for a moment, then all at once she did something which he did not expect. She slipped her hand under his arm. He was startled by the act itself certainly, and quite as much, too, by the palpably resolute character of this movement. But this being a delicate affair, Comrade Ossipon behaved with, delicacy. He contented himself by pressing the hand slightly against his robust ribs. At the same time he felt himself being impelled forward, and yielded to the impulse. At the end of Brett Street he became aware of being directed to the left. He submitted.

The fruiterer at the corner had put out the blazing glory of his oranges and lemons, and Brett Place was all darkness, interspersed with the misty halos of the few lamps defining its triangular shape, with a cluster of three lights on one stand in the middle. The dark forms of the man and woman glided slowly arm in arm along the walls with a loverlike and homeless aspect in the miserable night.

`What would you say if I were to tell you that I was going to find you?' Mrs Verloc asked, gripping his arm with force.

`I would say that you couldn't find anyone more ready to help you in your trouble,' answered Ossipon, with a notion of making tremendous headway. In fact, the progress of this delicate affair was almost taking his breath away.