d,--white round jars with pink tops,
bottles of hair-oil with ribbons round the neck, manicure things, heaps
of silver things, and boxes with Chinese patterns on them, and one
thing, open, with what was mighty like rouge in it. And clothes all over
the place--red silk dressing-gown with golden tassels, and red leather
slippers!

"I don't remember noticing any of this at the moment, but it all comes
back to me as soon as I begin to think of it--and the room stank of
scent!"

But of course it was the old man in the corner who mattered. It was, I
think, very significant of Lawrence's character and his
unEnglish-English tradition that the first thing that he felt was the
pathos of it. No other Englishman in Petrograd would have seen that at
all.

Wilderling was crouched in the corner against a piece of gold Japanese
embroidery. He was in the shadow, away from the window, which was pushed
open sufficiently to allow the muzzle of the rifle to slip between the
woodwork and the pane. The old man, his white hair disordered, his
clothes dusty, and his hands grimy, crept forward just as Lawrence
entered, fired down into the side-street, then moved swiftly back into
his corner again. He muttered to himself without ceasing in French,
"Chiens! Chiens!... Chiens!" He was very hot, and he stopped for a
moment to wipe the sweat from his forehead, then he saw Lawrence.

"What do you want?" he asked, as though he didn't recognize him.

Lawrence moved down the side of the room, avoiding the window. He
touched the little man's arm.

"I say, you know," he said, "this won't do."

Wilderling smelt of gunpowder, and he was breathing hard as though he
had been running desperately. He quivered when Lawrence touched him.

"Go away!" he said, "you mustn't come here.... I'll get them yet--I tell
you I'll get them yet--I tell you I'll get them--Let them dare...
Chiens... Chiens..." He jerked his rifle away from the window and
began, with trembling fingers, to load it again.

Lawrence gripped his arm. "When I did that," he said, "it felt as though
there wasn't an arm there at all, but just a bone which I could break if
I pressed a bit harder."

"Come away!" he said. "You damn fool--don't you see that it's hopeless?"

"And I'd always been so respectful to him...." he added in parenthesis.

Wilderling hissed at him, saying no words, just drawing in his breath.

"I've got two of them," he whispered suddenly. "I'll get them all."

Then a