at appeared to be a genteel dressmaking establishment.
By the aid of a friend of mine, a dealer in furnishing goods, whom I
thought it prudent to take into my confidence, I ascertained that she
called herself Mrs. Helm (an ineffectual disguise of the Norwegian
Hjelm), that she was a widow of quiet demeanor and most exemplary
habits, and that she had worked as a seamstress in the establishment
during the past four months. My friend elicited these important facts
under the pretence of wishing to employ her himself in the shirtmaking
department of his own business.

Having through the same agency obtained the street and number of her
boarding-place, I visited her landlady, who dispelled my last doubts,
and moreover, informed me (perhaps under the impression that I was a
possible suitor) that Mrs. Helm was as fine a lady as ever trod God's
earth, and a fit wife for any man. The same evening I conveyed to
Storm the result of my investigations.

He sat listening to me with a grave intensity of expression, which at
first I hardly knew how to interpret. Now and then I saw his lips
quivering, and as I described the little scene with the child in the
park, he rose abruptly and began to walk up and down on the floor. As
I had finished, he again dropped down into the chair, raised his eyes
devoutly to the ceiling, and murmured:

"Thank God!"

Thus he sat for a long while, sometimes moving his lips inaudibly, and
seemingly unconscious of my presence. Then suddenly he sprang up and
seized his hat and cane.

"It was number 532?" he said, laying hold of the door-knob.

"Yes," I answered, "but you surely do not intend to see her to-night."

"Yes, I do."

"But it is after nine o'clock, and she may--"

But he was already half way down the stairs.

Through a dense, drizzling rain which made the gas-lights across the
street look like moons set in misty aureoles, Storm hastened on until
he reached the unaristocratic locality of Emily's dwelling. He rang
the door-bell, and after some slight expostulation with the servant
was permitted to enter. Groping his way through a long, dimly-lit
hall, he stumbled upon a staircase, which he mounted, and paused at
the door which had been pointed out to him. A slender ray of light
stole out through the key-hole, piercing the darkness without
dispelling it. Storm hesitated long at the door before making up his
mind to knock; a strange quivering agitation had come upon him, as if
he were about