d to stop on the way. We sold everything we had; some
people collected a hundred francs for us; and we just managed to buy our
tickets. Felicia didn't want to come, but I made her. I couldn't see her
die before my eyes. We've starved for months. We've parted with
everything, and I've written to Mr. Melrose again and again. He's never
answered--till a few weeks ago, and he said if we troubled him again
he'd stop the money. He's a bad, bad man."

Shaking, her teeth chattering, her hands clenched at her side, the
forlorn creature stared at Victoria. She was not old, but she was a
wreck; a withered, emaciated wreck of the woman Victoria had once seen
twenty years before.

Victoria, laying a gentle hand upon her, drew an armchair forward.

"Sit down, please, and rest. You shall have food directly. I will have
rooms got ready. And this is your daughter?"

She went up to the girl who stood shivering like her mother, and
speechless. But her proud black eyes met Victoria's with a passion in
them that seemed to resent a touch, a look. "She ought to be lovely!"
thought Victoria; "she is--if one could feed and dress her."

"You poor child! Come and lie down."

She took hold of the girl and guided her to a sofa. When they reached it,
the little creature fell half fainting upon it. But she controlled
herself by an astonishing effort, thanked Victoria in Italian, and
curling herself up in a corner she closed her eyes. The white profile on
the dark sofa cushion was of a most delicate perfection, and as Victoria
helped to remove her hat she saw a small dark head covered with short
curls like a boy's.

Netta Melrose looked round the beautiful room, its pictures, its deep
sofas and chairs, its bright fire, and then at the figures of Victoria
and the housekeeper in the distance. Victoria was giving her orders. The
tears were on Netta's cheeks. Yet she had the vague, ineffable feeling of
one just drawn from the waves. She had done right. She had saved herself
and Felicia.

Food was brought, and wine. They were coaxed to eat, warmed and
comforted. Then Victoria took them up through the broad, scented passages
of the beautiful house to rooms that had been got ready for them.

"Don't talk any more to-night. You shall tell me everything to-morrow. My
maid will help you. I will come back presently to see you have everything
you want."

Felicia, frowning, wished to unpack their small hand-bag, with its shabby
contents, for herself. Bu