.

"Got you all right now, my lady!" fell with a chuckle from her lips. "A
vampire, ha!" The chuckle was changed for a kind of hiss. "Well, have it
so. There is rich blood in your veins, and it will be no fault of mine
if I do not fatten upon it. As for pity, you shall have as much of it
as you gave to that helpless baby. Saints don't work in this kind of
business, and I'm not a saint."

And she chuckled and hissed and muttered to herself, with many signs of
evil satisfaction.

CHAPTER VIII.

_FOR_ an hour Mrs. Bray waited the reappearance of Pinky Swett, but the
girl did not come back. At the end of this time a package which had been
left at the door was brought to her room. It came from Mrs. Dinneford,
and contained two hundred dollars. A note that accompanied the package
read as follows:

"Forgive my little fault of temper. It is your interest to be my friend.
The woman must not, on any account, be suffered to come near me."

Of course there was no signature. Mrs. Bray's countenance was radiant as
she fingered the money.

"Good luck for me, but bad for the baby," she said, in a low, pleased
murmur, talking to herself. "Poor baby! I must see better to its
comfort. It deserves to be looked after. I wonder why Pinky doesn't
come?"

Mrs. Bray listened, but no sound of feet from the stairs or entries, no
opening or shutting of doors, broke the silence that reigned through the
house.

"Pinky's getting too low down--drinks too much; can't count on her any
more." Mrs. Bray went on talking to herself. "No rest; no quiet; never
satisfied; for ever knocking round, and for ever getting the worst
of it. She was a real nice girl once, and I always liked her. But she
doesn't take any care of herself."

As Pinky went out, an hour before, she met a fresh-looking girl, not
over seventeen, and evidently from the country. She was standing on the
pavement, not far from the house in which Mrs. Bray lived, and had
a traveling-bag in her hand. Her perplexed face and uncertain manner
attracted Pinky's attention.

"Are you looking for anybody?" she asked.

"I'm trying to find a Mrs. Bray," the girl answered. "I'm a stranger
from the country."

"Oh, you are?" said Pinky, drawing her veil more tightly so that her
disfigured face could not be seen.

"Yes I'm from L----."

"Indeed? I used to know some people there."

"Then you've been in L----?" said the girl, with a pleased, trustful
manner, as of one who had met