k."

"She can go to New York without that! That contemptible man! I knew all
summer he was filling her head with romantic notions, but I never dreamed
of this. Why, she's nothing but a child! She doesn't know what love
is----" Then her voice broke in sudden panic. "We must stop it at any
cost. Go--go promise her anything. Tell her I'll send her to New York, to
Europe, anywhere to get her out of that wretch's clutches. My poor child!
My poor baby!"

Her grief was no less violent than her anger had been, and her tearless
sobs almost shook her worn old frame to pieces.

Quin knew just how she felt. It had been like that with him last night
when he heard the news. With one stride he was beside her and had
gathered her into his arms.

"There, there!" he said tenderly. "It's going to be all right. We are
going to find a way out."

This unexpected caress, probably the first one Madam had received in many
years, reduced her to a state of unprecedented humility. She transferred
her resentment from Eleanor to Harold Phipps, and announced herself ready
to follow whatever course Quin suggested.

"I'd offer her just this and nothing more," he advised: "The fare to New
York, tuition at the dramatic school, and ten dollars a week."

"She can't live on that."

"Yes, she can. Rose Martel does."

Madam became truculent at once.

"Don't quote that girl to me. Eleanor's been used to very different
surroundings."

"That's the point. Let her have what she hasn't been used to. You have
tried giving her a bunch of your money and telling her how to spend it.
Try giving her a little of her own and letting her do as she likes with
it."

"I don't care what she does for the present, if she just won't marry that
man Phipps. Make her give you her word of honor not to have anything
whatever to do with him for the next six months. By that time she will
have forgotten all about him."

"I'll do my best," said Quin, rising. "You'll hear from me first thing in
the morning."

"Well, go now! But ring first for Hannah. We must pack the child's things
to-night. The main thing is to get her out of town before that hound can
get here. Don't you think either Ranny or Isobel had better take her on
to New York to-morrow?"

Quin returned to the Martels' breathing easily for the first time in
twenty-four hours. As he passed Rose's room on the way to his own, he saw
a light over the transom, and heard the girls' voices rising in heated
argument. H