st
talking a bit and she was telling me that she was from London and that
when she was a little girl a great book-writer used to pat her on the
head and call her a pretty little thing and give her pennies and how
she'd run away from home with a young officer, who got into trouble
afterwards and came out to Australia without her and how she came out to
find him and would some day, when a policeman came along and asked us
what we were doing. She said we weren't doing anything and that he'd
better mind his business and he said he knew her and she'd better keep a
civil tongue in her head. Then he wanted to know what my name was and
where I lived and the girl told me not to tell him or he'd play a trick
on me and I didn't. But I told him I worked at dressmaking and roomed
with another girl and he gave a kind of laugh and said he thought so and
that if I didn't give him my name and address I'd have to come along with
him. I began to cry and the girl told him he ought to be ashamed of
himself ruining a poor hard-working girl who was looking for her sister
and he only laughed again and said he knew all about that. I don't know
what would have happened only just then an oldish man came along, wearing
spectacles and with a kind sharp face, who stopped and asked what was the
matter. The policeman was very civil to him and seemed to know him and
told him that I wouldn't give him my address and that I was no good and
that he was only doing his duty. The girl called the policeman names and
told how it really was, only not my name, and the man looked at me and
told the policeman I was shabby enough to be honest and that he'd answer
for me and the policeman touched his hat and said 'good-night, sir,' and
went on. Then the man told me I'd had a narrow escape and that it should
be a lesson to me to keep out of bad company and I told him the girl had
told the truth and he laughed, but not like the policeman, and said that
was all the more reason to be careful because policemen could do what
they liked with dressmakers who had no friends. Then be pulled out some
money and told me to be a good girl and offered it to me, so kindly, but
of course I didn't take it. Then he shook hands and walked off. There are
kind people in the world, Ned, but we don't always meet them when we need
them. I didn't know then how much he did for me or what cruel, wicked
laws there are.

"Next week I met the girl again. I wanted so to find Mary I didn't care
for