anything, and good-bye. Say good-bye to the
whatever-you-call-um girl, and--can't I have another kiss? No. You're
quite right. Good-bye.'

A should told him that it was not seemly to charge of the mail-bag
incline. He reached the pier as the steamer began to move off, and he
followed her with his heart.

'And there's nothing--nothing in the wide world--to keep us apart except
her obstinacy. These Calais night-boats are much too small. I'll get
Torp to write to the papers about it. She's beginning to pitch already.'

Maisie stood where Dick had left her till she heard a little gasping
cough at her elbow. The red-haired girl's eyes were alight with cold
flame.

'He kissed you!' she said. 'How could you let him, when he wasn't
anything to you? How dared you to take a kiss from him? Oh, Maisie,
let's go to the ladies' cabin. I'm sick,--deadly sick.'

'We aren't into open water yet. Go down, dear, and I'll stay here.
I don't like the smell of the engines.... Poor Dick! He deserved
one,--only one.

But I didn't think he'd frighten me so.'

Dick returned to town next day just in time for lunch, for which he had
telegraphed. To his disgust, there were only empty plates in the studio.

He lifted up his voice like the bears in the fairy-tale, and Torpenhow
entered, looking guilty.

'H'sh!' said he. 'Don't make such a noise. I took it. Come into my
rooms, and I'll show you why.'

Dick paused amazed at the threshold, for on Torpenhow's sofa lay a
girl asleep and breathing heavily. The little cheap sailor-hat, the
blue-and-white dress, fitter for June than for February, dabbled with
mud at the skirts, the jacket trimmed with imitation Astrakhan and
ripped at the shoulder-seams, the one-and-elevenpenny umbrella, and,
above all, the disgraceful condition of the kid-topped boots, declared
all things.

'Oh, I say, old man, this is too bad! You mustn't bring this sort up
here.

They steal things from the rooms.'

'It looks bad, I admit, but I was coming in after lunch, and she
staggered into the hall. I thought she was drunk at first, but it was
collapse. I couldn't leave her as she was, so I brought her up here and
gave her your lunch. She was fainting from want of food. She went fast
asleep the minute she had finished.'

'I know something of that complaint. She's been living on sausages,
I suppose. Torp, you should have handed her over to a policeman for
presuming to faint in a respectable house. Poor little wretch!