ven you so
much trouble already. He won't come back--he's tired of me. He could
find me if he wanted to, and watching and hunting for him like this
would only set him more and more against me."

Rainham, as he listened to her, rather puzzled by her sudden change
of attitude since their last interview, was forced to admit mentally
that her reasoning, if it lacked spontaneity, was, at all events,
indisputably sound; and while he found himself doubting whether the
victim was not better versed in worldliness than he had at first
suspected, he still felt a curious reluctance which, though he was
half ashamed of his delicacy, prevented him from suggesting that,
sentimental reasons apart, the betrayer still ought to be
discovered, if only in order to force him to provide for the
maintenance of his child. It hardly, perhaps, occurred to him that
he, after all, would be the person who would suffer most, and he
certainly did not for an instant credit the girl with any ulterior
designs upon his purse.

"Oh, I don't know," he said feebly. "Perhaps he does not know where
you are. And I dare say, if he saw the child----"

"The child?" echoed the woman bitterly. "That's just the worst of
it!"

Rainham sighed, forced again to acknowledge his lower standing in
the wisdom of the world. He would have given a great deal to be able
to get up and go.

"Then you don't want me to employ a detective, or to advertise,
or--or to make an appeal to the editor of the _Outcry_?"

Mrs. Crichton seemed to welcome the opportunity afforded by this
direct questioning.

"No," she said, "I think it would be better not. I don't want to
seem ungrateful, sir--and I'm sure I thank you very, very much for
all you have done for me--but I think you had better take no more
trouble about it. If I can get work I shall do all right."

In spite of the girl's evident attempt to pull herself together, her
voice was less brave than her words, and they conveyed but little
assurance to the listener. He shrugged his shoulders somewhat
impatiently: the interview was beginning to tell upon his nerves.

"Of course, it's for you to decide, and I suppose you have thought
it well out, and have good reason for this alteration of purpose.
But when you talk about work----?"

He finished his sentence with a note of inquiry and a half
apologetic glance at her slight form and frail, white fingers.

"I haven't always been a model," she explained with some dignity.
"Would