She had whirled catherine-wheel fashion, head over heels from end to end
of the stage. The long-haired youth swept the hair from his hot,
blue-jowled face in time to catch her, and they stood side by side, she
with her thin arms stretched up straight in a gesture of triumph, her
lips still parted in that curiously empty, expectant smile.

Then it was over. Once the curtain rose to perfunctory applause. People
settled back in their seats, or prepared to go. It was as though the
fire had been withdrawn from a molten metal which began instantly to
harden. A woman next to Stonehouse tittered.

"So vulgar and silly--I don't know what people see in her."

"I want to get away," Cosgrave said sharply. "It's this beastly
closeness."

He looked and walked as though he had been drinking.

Although the show was not over, the majority of the audience had begun to
stream out. Two men who loitered in the gangway in front of Stonehouse
exchanged laconic comments.

"A live wire, eh, what?"

For some reason or other Stonehouse saw clearly and remembered afterwards
the face of the man who answered. It was bloated and full of a weary,
humorous intelligence.

"Life itself, my dear fellow, life itself!"