ctive to
Hilda. It promised the most delicious experience that she had ever had.

"Yes," retorted Mrs. Lessways. "And leave you here by yourself! A nice
thing!"

"I shall be all right," said Hilda confidently and joyously. She was
sure that the excursion to London had appealed to her mother's latent
love of the unexpected, and that her faculty for accepting placidly
whatever fate offered would prevent her from resisting the pressure that
Sarah Gailey and Mr. Cannon would obviously exert.

"Shall you!" Mrs. Lessways muttered.

"Why not take your daughter with you, too?" Mr. Cannon suggested.

"Oh!" cried Hilda, shocked. "I couldn't possibly leave my work just
now.... The paper just coming out.... You couldn't spare me." She spoke
with pride, using phrases similar to those which he had used to explain
to Sarah Gailey why he could not remain with her in London even for a
night.

"Oh yes, I could," he answered kindly, lightly, carelessly,
shattering--in his preoccupation with one idea--all her fine, loyal
pretensions. "We should manage all right."

III

She was hurt. She was mortally pierced. The blow was too cruel. She
lowered her glance before his, and fixed it on the table-cloth. Her brow
darkened. Her lower lip bulged out. She was the child again. He had with
atrocious inhumanity reduced her to the unimportance of a child. She had
bestowed on him and his interests the gift of her whole soul, and he had
said that it was negligible. And the worst was that he was perfectly
unaware of what he had done. He had not even observed the symptoms of
her face. He had turned at once to the older women and was continuing
the conversation. He had ridden over her, and ridden on without a look
behind. The conversation moved, after a pause, back to the plausible
excuse for his call. He desired to see some old rent-book which would
show how the doomed tenant in Calder Street had originally fallen into
arrears.

"Where is that old book of Mr. Skellorn's, Hilda?" her mother asked.

She could not speak. The sob was at her throat. If she had spoken it
would have burst through, and she would have been not merely the child,
but the disgraced child.

"Hilda!" repeated her mother.

Her singular silence drew the attention of all. She blushed a sombre
scarlet. No! She could not speak. She cursed herself. "What a little
fool I am! Surely I can..." Useless! She could not speak. She took the
one desperate course open to her, and ran