The movement of hands was almost simultaneous, but it began with Sally. Gaga clasped her left one in his right. Only for a minute. Then Sally could not resist a giggle, and the compact was unsignalised. They talked further, Sally once again in a state of delight, and Gaga inclined to be repetitious. And then, as it was nine o'clock, Sally said she must go. He saw her to her omnibus, and they parted as friends. From her seat inside, as the bus moved off, Sally waved to him; and afterwards settled down to the journey, full of memories and reflections of a curious and enchanting character. Not of Gaga were these reflections, save with an occasionally frowning brow of doubt; but of the remarkable vista which had been opened by his demand for friendship and help. An excited recollection of the lights and the mirrors and the overwhelming noise of the restaurant intoxicated her afresh. Her whole face was shining with excitement. She smiled to herself, occupied with such a mixture of sensations and imaginings that at one moment she wondered whether she was Sally Minto at all, and whether some magician had not changed that Sally for a new creature born to spend her days in gaudy restaurants and among all the noise and luxury of such a life as she had led this evening for an hour and a half. One moment at home was enough to convince Sally that no magician had been at work. It was the same squalid house, and the same squalid room that she reached after the splendour of her dinner. And it was the same fretful mother who complained of her lateness and chided her for the dangers she ran in being about the streets so late. Sally made no answer. She looked in the mirror at the dilated pupils of her glowing eyes, and at her flushed cheeks and laughing lips; and her heart first sank and then violently rebelled against the contrast of this hideous place with the light and colour she had left. She was a rebel. The contrast was too great. How could she live in a room like this? How could anybody live? It was not life at all, but a mere grovelling. And Sally had tasted something that thrilled her. She had come into contact with a life resembling the life led by those who travelled in the motor broughams she so much admired. She was ravenous for such a life. Her natural arrogance was roused and inflamed by the comparison she so instinctively made between her natural surroundings and those to which she felt she was entitled by her capacities. She thought with contempt of the other girls at Madame Gala's. The wine she had drunk, the noises she had heard, mounted higher. She was primed with conceit and excitement. Hitherto she had only determined by ambition to use the world and attain comfort and success. Now she felt the _power_ to attain this success. She could not experience the feeling without despising every other feeling. She looked round the room in scorn--at the dull, shabby bed, and the meagre furniture, and at the little old woman who