ng woman--disgust. To me it is a horrible
sight, the lust of an old man. You can argue as long as you like, but
that is one of my fixed eternal prejudices. I feel sick when I see an
old man giving way to it. I feel that somehow or other he is debasing
humanity. That was the real reason why I jumped up and went over to
Croasan.

"He looked up at me as I stood over the table. I could see the crease in
his cheeks, the sag under his eyes, and the grey roots of his dyed
moustache. He looked up at me as I raised my hand. 'Let her go,' I said,
shouting at him above the jangle of the piano, 'let her go, Mr.
Croasan.' He was holding her down on his knee.

"'Mind your own affairs!' he says to me, showing his teeth, great dirty
yellow fangs; 'Is she yours?' he says. The Belgian engineer sitting near
him laughed at this and looked up sneering at me. 'Let her go,' I said
again. 'Rosa's a friend of mine,' says he, still holding her. Just then
I saw Rebecca's head over the piano, and as I looked down again I saw a
peculiar expression on Rosa's face. Her eyes were on me and she seemed
to be thinking 'What are you waiting for?' It all happened, you know,
in two or three seconds. I waited no more. I put the flat of my hand
across Croasan's mouth, hard. He jerked back to avoid it, and the tray
that Rosa was trying to set down on the table, so that she could get at
him with her nails, went all over him. The old woman came round the
piano and saw him. Croasan started up and I hit him again, and he fell
over the Belgian.

"At first I thought I was in for a big row. But Croasan had more
experience than I had. He'd been in rows before. When he started up it
was not to hit me, but to get out. He crawled under the table between
the Belgian's legs and ran to the door. The others were crowding all
round me, arguing and shouting. The young chap at the piano was standing
up and looking over the top, and Rebecca was trying to calm them. 'Easy,
gentlemen!' she kept on calling. Rosa had disappeared. Then the Belgian
jumped up and shouted, 'Ee interfere wis my frien'!' pointing at me, and
marching out.

"When we got quiet again I began to explain to Rebecca what had
happened. Do you know, I thought that was the real danger. I thought she
would be the one to get on to me for interfering. Rebecca was a woman
who looked more evil than she really was. She sat down at my table, and
while I told her and the piano jangled away again, she kept patting my
a