of me for watching. At first
I was just wild. And then, afterward, I said to myself I didn't know
but what I'd just as soon you _did_ think it, and then we'd have it
out, and we'd see what we could make of it between us."

"Make of it?" he breathed.

"Well--I suppose you'll have to make something of it, won't you?"

"Between us?" He smiled faintly.

"Between us. I suppose if I've made you feel like that I've got to
help you."

"To help _me_?"

"To help anyone who wants it.--You don't mind if I keep on looking
at the Casino instead of looking at you? I can talk just the
same.--And then, you see, it was because of me she left you--by the
one-forty-four train."

"Because of you?"

"Because of the way you looked at me last night. She saw you."

He remembered.

"She saw that you thought I wasn't straight; and she saw that that
was what interested you."

"Ah," he cried. "I was a cad. Why don't you tell me so? Why don't
you pitch into me?"

"Because I fancy you've got about enough to bear. You see, I saw it
all, and I was so sorry--so sorry."

She left it there a moment for him to take it in, her beautiful,
astounding sorrow.

"And I just wanted to start right in and help you."

He murmured something incoherent, something that made her smile.

"Oh, it wasn't for the sake of _your_ fine eyes, Mr.
I-don't-know-your-name. It was because of her. I could see her
saying to her dear little self, 'That woman isn't straight. He isn't
straight, either. He won't do.' That's the sort of man she thought
you were."

"But it wasn't as if she didn't know me, as if she didn't care. She
did care."

"She did, indeed."

"Then why," he persisted, "why did she leave me?"

"Don't you understand?" (Her voice went all thick and tender in her
throat.) "She was thinking of the children. You couldn't see her
with those teeny, teeny things, and not know that's what she would
think of."

"But," he wailed, "it wasn't as if they were her own children."

"Oh, how stupid you are! It was her own children she _was_ thinking
of."

IV

"So that was her reason," he said presently.

"Of course. Of course. It's the reason for the whole thing. It's the
reason why, when a young man like you sees a young woman like me--I
mean like the lady you thought I was--in an over-stimulating and
tempestuous place like this, instead of taking off his silly hat to
her, he should jam it well down over his silly ears and--quit!"

"You keep on s