som."

The girl was only half willing. Macheson declined to let them go.

"No!" he said, "I will have my question answered."

Hurd turned as though to strike him, but Holderness intervened, head and
shoulders taller than the other.

"I think," he said, "that we will have my friend's question answered."

Hurd was almost shaking with rage, but he answered.

"To some friends in Cambridge Terrace," he said sullenly. "Number
eighteen."

"You will not object," Macheson said, "if I accompany you there?"

"I'll see you damned first," Hurd answered savagely. "Get in, Letty."

The girl hesitated. She turned to Macheson.

"I should like to go to the station and wait," she declared.

"I think," Macheson said, "that you had better trust yourself to me and
my friend."

"I am sure of it," Holderness added calmly.

She put her hand in Macheson's. She was as pale as death and avoided
looking at Hurd. He took a quick step towards her.

"Very well, young lady," he said. "If you go now, you understand that I
shall never see you again."

She began to cry again.

"I wish," she murmured, "that I had never seen you at all--never!"

He turned on his heel. A row was impossible. It occurred to him that a
man of the world would face such a position calmly.

"Very good," he said, "we will leave it at that."

He paused to light a cigarette, and strolled back down the street
towards the restaurant which they had just left. Letty was crying now in
good earnest. The two young men looked at one another in something like
dismay. Then Holderness began to laugh quietly.

"You're a nice sort of Don Quixote to spend an evening with," he
remarked softly.

CHAPTER XVII

THE VICTIMS OF SOCIETY

The girl was still crying, softly but persistently. She caught hold of
Macheson's arm.

"If you please, I think I had better go back to Stephen," she said. "Do
you think I could find him?"

"I think you had much better not, Letty," he answered. "He ought not to
have let you miss your train. My friend here and I are going to look
after you."

"It's very kind of you," the girl said listlessly, "but it doesn't
matter much what becomes of me now. Mother will never forgive me--and
the others will all know--that I missed the train."

"We must think of some way of putting that all right," Macheson
declared. "I only wish that I had some relations in London. Can you
suggest anything, Dick?"

"I can take the young lady to some decent ro