louse, and felt certain that
even her most intimate friends would not recognize her. She folded the
rain-coat, and placed it smoothly in the suit-case, then with dismay
remembered that she had nothing in which to put her own cloth dress, save
the few inadequate paper wrappings that had come about her simple
purchases. Vainly she tried to reduce the dress to a bundle that would be
covered by the papers. It was of no use. She looked down at the suit-case.
There was room for the dress in there, but she wanted to send Mr. Dunham's
property back at once. She might leave the dress in the store, but some
detective with an accurate description of that dress might be watching,
find it, and trace her. Besides, she shrank from leaving her garments
about in public places. If there had been any bridge near at hand where
she might unobserved throw the dress into a dark river, or a consuming
fire where she might dispose of it, she would have done it. But whatever
she was to do with it must be done at once. Her destiny must be settled
before the darkness came down. She folded the dress smoothly and laid it
in the suit-case, under the rain-coat.

She sat down at a writing-desk, in the waiting-room, and wrote: "I am
safe, and I thank you." Then she paused an instant, and with nervous haste
wrote "Mary" underneath. She opened the suit-case and pinned the paper to
the lapel of the evening coat. Just three dollars and sixty-seven cents
she had left in her pocket-book after paying the expressage on the
suit-case.

She felt doubtful whether she might not have done wrong about thus sending
her dress back, but what else could she have done? If she had bought a box
in which to put it, she would have had to carry it with her, and perhaps
the dress might have been found during her absence from her room, and she
suspected because of it. At any rate, it was too late now, and she felt
sure the young man would understand. She hoped it would not inconvenience
him especially to get rid of it. Surely he could give it to some
charitable organization without much trouble.

At her first waking, in the early gray hours of the morning, she had
looked her predicament calmly in the face. It was entirely likely that it
would continue indefinitely; it might be, throughout her whole life. She
could now see no way of help for herself. Time might, perhaps, give her a
friend who would assist her, or a way might open back into her old life in
some unthought-of manne