She heard Mr. Karslake, who was becomingly affable to one of inferior station, express the perfunctory hope that he hadn’t kept Nogam waiting long, and Nogam reply to the simple effect of “Oh, not at all, sir.”  To this he added that he ’oped there had been no ’itch, he was most heager to be installed in his new situation, and would do his best to give satisfaction.  Karslake replied airily that he was sure Nogam would do famously, and Nogam said “Thank you, sir.”  Then Karslake announced they must bustle along, because they were expected by some person unnamed, but just the same he meant to have a drink before he budged a foot.  And he called a waiter and requested a whiskey and soda for himself and some beer for Nogam....  And Sofia turned her attention to other things.

The murmur of their talk meant nothing to her after that, and she forgot them entirely till they got up to leave, and then wasted only a moment in wondering why Mr. Karslake, if he were, as he seemed to be, engaging a butler for some friend or employer, should have arranged to meet the man in a cafe of Soho.  But it didn’t matter, and she dismissed the incident from her mind.

What did matter was that she was to-day more than ever galled by the deadly circumstances of her existence.  If they were to continue to obtain, she felt, life would grow simply unendurable, and she would to do something reckless to get a little relief from the tedium and the ugliness of it all.

She was fed up with everything, the shrewishness of Mama Therese, the drunkenness of Papa Dupont, the hideous dullness of the cafe, the smell of food, the fumes of tobacco, the reek of wines.

She was fed up with the leers of Papa Dupont, the scowls of Mama Therese, the grimaces of waiters, the stares of customers, the very sight of herself in the mirror across the room.

She was fed up with being fed up, she wanted to do something lunatic, she wanted to kick and scream and drum on the floor with her heels.

And all the while, beyond the threshold, life in the street was flowing by, a restless stream, and the voice of it was a siren call to her hungry heart, whispering of freedom, laughing low of love, roaring robustly of brave adventures.

And she sat there with folded hands, mutinous yet impotent, afraid, a useless thing with sullen eyes ... wasted ...

As was her custom, between six and seven, before the busy hours of the evening, she had her dinner fetched to a table near by.

Somebody had left a copy of a morning paper on the wall-seat.  Sofia glanced through it without much interest.  None the less, when she had finished, she took the sheet back to the caisse with her and intermittently, as occasion offered, read snatches of it quite openly, so bored that she didn’t care if Mama Therese did catch her at this forbidden practice; a good row would be almost welcome ... anything to break the monotony....