movement,
scarcely ever aroused a petty inquisitiveness into the actions of the
passers-by. The traffic of the thoroughfare like the ships of the sea
went by merely apprehended, but not observed. The big bay-window hung
over the street like the stern-cabin of a frigate, and as Michael sat
there he had the impression of being cut off from communication, the
sense of perpetually leaving life astern. The door of 99 St. Giles did
not open directly on the street, but was reached by a tortuous passage
that ran the whole depth of the house. This entrance helped very much
the illusion of separation from the ebb and flow of ordinary existence,
and was so suggestive of a refuge that involuntarily Michael always
hurried through it that the sooner he might set his foot on the steep
and twisted staircase inside the house. There was always an excitement
in reaching this staircase again, an impulse to run swiftly up, as if
this return to the sitting-room was veritably an escape from the world.
Here the books sprawled everywhere. At 202 High they had filled the
cupboards in orderly fashion. Here they overflowed in dusty cataracts,
and tottered upward in crazy escalades and tremulous piles. All the
shelves were gorged with books. Moreover, Michael every afternoon bought
more books. The landlady held up her hands in dismay as, crunching up
the paper in which they had been wrapped, he considered in perplexity
their accommodation. More space was necessary, and the sea-green
dining-room was awarded shelves. Here every morning after breakfast came
the exiles, the dull and the disappointing books which had been banished
from the sitting-room. Foot by foot the sea-green walls disappeared
behind these shelves. In Lampard's bookshop Michael was certainly a
personality. Lampard himself even came to tea, and sat nodding his
approbation.

As for Alan, he used to stay unmoved by the invading volumes. He had
stipulated at the beginning that one small bookcase should be reserved
for him. Here Plato and Aristotle, Herodotus and Thucydides always had
room to breathe, without ever being called upon to endure the
contamination of worm-eaten bibliophily.

"Where the deuce has my Stubbs got to?" Michael would grumble, delving
into the musty cascade of old plays and chap books which had temporarily
obliterated the current literature of the week's work.

Alan would very serenely take down Plato from his own trim and
unimpeded shelves, and his brow would a