I can...."

"You're a dear," said June warmly. "I know you were the one to come
to. I'm quite sure when you've seen Esther you'll ... why, what's the
matter, Micky?"

Micky had looked up sharply. His face had paled a little.

"What name did you say?" he asked. He never knew how he managed to
control his voice. His heart seemed to be thumping in his throat.
"What name did you say?" he asked again, with an effort. "I did not
catch it----"

"It's Esther," said June, "Esther Shepstone."

CHAPTER VI

Micky's pencil jerked suddenly, sending an aimless scrawl across the
paper; for an instant he stared at his companion with blank eyes.
Fortunately June Mason was too intent on the relighting of her
cigarette to have any attention to spare for him; she went on talking
as she puffed.

"Yes...."--puff--"that's her name...." Another puff. "Isn't it a
change from your eternal Violets and Dorothys?"... Puff, puff. "Oh,
bother!" She threw the cigarette into an empty grate behind her and
prepared to give Micky her undivided attention once more. "Well, what
do you think about it? You haven't written her name down. Esther
Shepstone, I said.... Write it down," she commanded.

Micky obeyed at once. He was beginning to recover himself a little.

"I shall be able to help her all right," he said quickly. "Only, of
course, you won't let her know I'm mixed up in it at all; she'd hate
it if she knew, she...."

"How do you know she would?" June demanded with suspicion.

Micky met her eyes squarely.

"Well, you said she was proud or something, didn't you? And anyway I
don't want to pose as a blessed philanthropist; I'm not one either,
but I'll see what I can do for--for this new friend of yours. You say
she's poor?"

"Horribly poor, I'm afraid," said June with a sigh. "Micky, it's
rather pathetic--somebody sent her some money--not very much, but
still, it was money she evidently didn't expect. I've got a sort of
idea that it was from this man she's supposed to be engaged to----"

"Why do you say 'supposed'--she is engaged to him, isn't she?"

June shrugged her shoulders.

"She says so, and she wears a ring, but I've a sort of instinctive
feeling that there's something funny behind it. Anyway, I know she's
not happy; but don't interrupt. About this money--well, it was partly
my fault! I persuaded her to go and buy herself some clothes--she had
such a few things, poor child! And I even went with her and she bought
a fro