Nocturne

dway, thought she could see as its cause a small girl pushing a perambulator loaded with bundles of washing. Her first impulse was pity--"Poor little thing"; but the words were hardly in her mind before they were chased away by a faint indignation at the child for getting in the tram's way. Everybody ought to look where they were going. Ev-ry bo-dy ought to look where they were go-ing, said the pitching tramcar. Ev-ry bo-dy.... Oh, sickening! Jenny looked at her neighbour's paper--her refuge. "Striking speech," she read. Whose? What did it matter? Talk, talk.... Why didn't they do something? What were they to do? The tram pitched to the refrain of a comic song: "Actions speak louder than words!" That kid who was wheeling the perambulator full of washing.... Jenny's attention drifted away like the speech of one who yawns, and she looked again at her reflection. The girl in the sliding glass wouldn't say much. She'd think the more. She'd say, when Sir Herbert pressed for his answer, "My thoughts are my own, Sir