The drunken man looked on the starving woman, and
the curses died upon his lips. He began to shiver and to tremble from
head to foot. Valentine made a step towards him, but some in the crowd
interposed.
"Let him alone," they said. "You'll only make him worse. Leave him to
her."
The cab from which Julian had apparently just alighted was drawn up by
the kerbstone. Cuckoo, who had not uttered a word as yet, drew Julian
towards it. He staggered after her in silence, stumbled into the cab
and collapsed in a heap in the corner, half on the floor, half on the
seat. She got in after him, watched by the crowd, who seemed awed by the
abrupt silence of this yelling madman at the touch of this spectral girl
in black. Cuckoo gave her address to the cabman. Just as he was whipping
up his horse to drive away, she leaned forward out of the cab as if to
the crowd--really to one man in it.
"He's my man!" she said, drawing her thick eyebrows together, and with a
nod of her head. "He's my man. I'll see to him."
The cab drove off into the darkness.
CHAPTER VIII
AN AWAKENING
That drive in the night was taken in silence. Julian, a crumpled heap of
degraded humanity, slept. Cuckoo watched over him, half supporting him
with one thin arm.
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