Catherine lived very quietly and economically during her first few weeks at Gifford Road. She had to. Her earnings did not allow her much margin after she had paid Mrs. Carbass. Out of this margin she had to buy all kinds of things she had not counted on--chiefly changes of clothing, and ranging down to small but by no means negligible articles such as wool for darning and a toothbrush. She decided to have no communication whatever with her father, though at first she had considered whether she would not write to him to ask him to send her all the property that was her own. Finally she decided against this, thinking that she would not care to let him imagine she was in need of anything. Sometimes the fear came to her that he would find her out: he could easily discover her address by enquiring at the Cinema. At times the fear became a definite expectation, and on rare occasions the expectation developed into what was perilously near to a hope. Often in the streets she met people who knew her, and to these she never mentioned either her father or her attitude towards him. Most people in Kitchener Road knew or guessed what had happened: it did not cause much of a sensation, for worse things were common enough in Kitchener Road.... Kitchener Road was quite _blasé_ of domestic estrangements. Whenever Catherine was asked how she was getting on she replied, “Oh, quite nicely, thanks,” and would not pursue the subject. At the Cinema she found work easy but not particularly interesting. She was annoyed to find herself agreeing with her father that the Upton Rising Royal Cinema was “third-rate.” It was a tawdry building with an exterior of white stucco (now peeling off in great scabs), and an interior into which the light of day never penetrated. A huge commissionaire with tremendously large feet, attired in the sort of uniform Rupert of Hentzau wears on the stage, paced up and down in front of the entrance, calling unmelodiously: “Nah showin’ gran’ star progrem two, four, six, nine an’ a shillin’ this way children a penny the side daw ...” all in a single breath. For this trying performance he was paid the sum of sixteen shillings a week. Inside the building a couple of heavily powdered, heavily rouged, heavily scented girls fluttered about with electric torches. There was no orchestra, save on Saturday nights, when a violinist appeared in a shabby dress suit and played the Barcarolle from “Tales of Hoffman,” and similar selections. The rest of the time Catherine was free to play what she pleased, with but a general reservation that the music should be appropriate to the pictures shown.