eth set, had faced the storm. She now explored districts
and streets systematically, almost house by house. And when her spirit
broke at the end of the week, as her perpetual walks, the buffeting of
rain and wind soiled her clothing, broke breaches into her boots,
chapped her hands as glove seams gave way, the only thing that could
brace her up was the shrinkage of her hoard by a sovereign. She placed
the coin on the mantlepiece after counting the remainder. Monday morning
saw it reduced to eleven shillings and sixpence. When the crisis came
she had taken in sail by exchanging into the second floor back, then
fortunately vacant, thus saving three shillings in rent.

The sight of her melting capital was a horror which she faced only once
a week, for at other times she thrust the thought away, but it intruded
every time with greater insistence. Untrained still in economy she found
it impossible to reduce her expenditure below a pound. After paying off
the mortgage of eight and sixpence for her room and breakfast, she had
to set aside three shillings for fares, for she dared not wade overmuch
in the December mud. The manageress of a cafe lost in Marylebone had
heard her kindly, but had looked at her boots plastered with mud, then
at the dirty fringes of her petticoats and said, regretfully almost,
that she would not do. That day had cost Victoria a pound almost
wrenched out of the money drawer. But this wardrobe though an asset, was
an incubus, and Victoria at times often hated it, for it cost so much in
omnibus fares that she paid for it every day in food stolen from her
body.

By the end of the seventh week Victoria had reduced her hoard to four
pounds. She now applied for work like an automaton, often going twice to
the same shop without realising it, at other times sitting for hours on
a park seat until the drizzle oozed from her hair into her neck. At the
end of the seventh week she had so lost consciousness of the world that
she walked all through the Sunday gloom without food. Then, at eight
o'clock, awakening suddenly to her need, she gorged herself with suet
pudding at an eating house in the Edgware Road, came back to Star Street
and fell into a heavy sleep.

About four she was aroused by horrible sickness which left her weak,
every muscle relaxed and every nerve strained to breaking point. Shapes
blacker than the night floated before her eyes; every passing milk
cart rattled savagely through her beating temples