In the railway carriage the passengers noticed her pallor, and they wondered what her trouble was, and at Victoria the omnibus conductor just saved her from being run over.  The omnibus jogged on, stopping now and then for people to get in and out, and Evelyn wondered at the extraordinary mechanism of life, and she took note of everyone’s peculiarities, wondering what were their business and desires, and wondering also at the conductor’s voice crying out the different parts of the town the omnibus would pass through.

“This is Berkeley Street, miss, if you are getting out here.”

She waited a few minutes at the corner, and then wandered down the street, asking herself if it was yet too late to turn back.

The sun glanced through the foliage, and glittered on the cockades of the coachmen and on the shining hides of the horses.  It was the height of the season, and the young beauties of the year, and the fashionable beauties of the last decade, lay back, sunning themselves under the shade of their parasols.  The carriages came round the square close to the curb, under the waving branches, and, waiting for an opportunity to cross, Evelyn’s eyes followed an unusually beautiful carriage, drawn by a pair of chestnut horses.  She did not see the lady’s face, but she wore a yellow dress, and the irises in her bonnet nodded over the hood of the carriage.  This lady, graceful and idle, seemed to mean something, but what?  Evelyn thought of the picture of the colonnade in the gallery.

The men to whom the stately servants opened the doors wore long frock coats pinched at the waist, and they swung their canes and carried their thick, yellow gloves in their hands.  They were all like Owen.  They all lived as he lived, for pleasure; they were all here for the season, for balls and dinner parties, for love-making and the opera.

“They are the people,” Evelyn thought, “who will pay thousands to hear me sing.  They are the people who will invite me to their houses.  If my voice is cultivated, if I ever go abroad.”

She ran across the street and walked under the branches until she came to a gate.  But why not go straight to the house?  She did not know....  She was at the gate, and the square looked green and cool.  The gate swung to and closed with a snap; but she had the key and could leave when she liked, and worn out with various fears she walked aimlessly about the grass plots.  There was no one in the square, so if he were watching for her he could not fail to see her.  Once more a puerile hope crossed her mind fitfully, that perhaps it would be as well if he failed to see her.  But no, since she had gone so far she was determined to go on to the end, and before this determination, her spirits revived, and she waited for him to come to her.  But for shyness she did not dare to look round, and the minutes she walked under the shady trees were very delightful, for she was penetrated with an intimate conviction that she would not be disappointed.  And one of the moments of her life that fixed itself most vividly on her mind was when she saw Owen coming towards her through the trees.  He was so tall and thin, and walked so gracefully; there was something in his walk that delighted her; it seemed to her that it was like the long, soft stride of a cat.