"You don't say," Mrs. Ufford returned, "that's funny."

They were very near the brougham now. It stood as deserted as when
Caroline had left it. The baby in the bundled blanket neither cried
nor stirred.

"He's the best child," said the woman, with her tired, kindly smile.
"He's next to nothing to tend to. If he'd felt to go back to her
folks with it, I'd 'a' gone with him to look after it. I've got
enough for that--the things sold real well, and he'd never let me
lose, anyhow. He isn't that kind. I took a real likin' to both of
'em. I've kept boarders, all over, for fifteen years and I never
lost a cent from anybody like him, not one. You get to know all
sorts, keepin' boarders, and Mr. Williston's all right--though you
mightn't think so," she ended loyally.

Caroline hardly listened. She saw herself in the bearskin reception
room, up the stairs, in the library, her baby in her arms; she heard
the incredulous joy of the Duchess, she explained importantly with
convincing detail, to Cousin Richard the critical. To her eager soul
this thin, friendly woman was merely an incident; that irritable,
incoherent man less than a dream.

They paused on the curb, and she opened the brougham door
hospitably.

"You get in first," she said, "and then I can hold him a little
while, can't I?"

"I never was in one o' these," Mrs. Ufford answered doubtfully,
"s'pose you go in first. It can't go--or back, or anything, can it?"

"No, no, of course not," said Caroline impatiently. "There's Hunt
'way up the street--he doesn't see us--how he's hurrying!"

The woman paused, her foot on the broad step.

"'Taint Hunt--it's Mr. Williston," she announced. "What's he want, I
wonder? Look--he's wavin' at us! I guess he forgot some paper he
wants you to take--he's bound to have it legal," she added with a
sigh. "No, dear, let me be. I'll see what he wants before I get in."

The young man was running fast; his face was red, his eyes anxious.

"Have you got it? Is it here?" he cried, panting, and as she lifted
the bundle high, his face cleared and Caroline saw that he was very
handsome.

"Oh, Mrs. Ufford," he gasped, "read this! Just read it! I found it
in my pocket-book--I thought you might be gone--she put it there for
me--my poor little Lou! My God, what a brute--what a brute!"

The woman, one foot still on the step of the brougham, supported the
child on her raised knee and held the paper in her free hand.

"_My dearest husband_,"