the lists of the charitable societies or the district
magistrates. But you would find just as much to do for them."

"I should not even know how to act in such company."

"You can go home for a year, if you like, to be taught, to some people I
know; delightful people, who will understand. A year! You will learn in
three months--what odds and ends there are to know. I couldn't spare you
for a year."

Lindsay stopped. He had to. Captain Filbert was murmuring the cadences
of a hymn. She went through two stanzas, and--covered her eyes for a
moment with her hand. When she spoke it was in a quiet, level, almost
mechanical way. "Yes," she said. "The Cross and the Crown, the Crown and
the Cross. Father in Heaven, I do not forget Thy will and Thy purpose,
that I should bring the word of Thy love to the poor and the lowly, the
outcast and those despised. And what I say to this man, who offers me
the gifts and the gladness of a world that had none for Thee, is the
answer Thou hast put in my heart--that the work is Thine and that I am
Thine, and he has no part or lot in me, nor can ever have. Here is
Crooked lane. Good-night, Mr. Lindsay."

She had slipped into the devious darkness of the place before he could
find any reply, before he quite realised, indeed, that they had reached
her lodging. He could only utter a vague "Good-night" after her,
formulating more definite statements to himself a few minutes later in
Bentinck street.

CHAPTER XI.

Miss Howe was walking in the business quarter of Calcutta. It was the
business quarter, and yet the air was gay with the dimpling of piano
notes, and looking up one saw the bright sunlight fall on yellow
stuccoed flats above the shops and the offices. There the pleasant north
wind blew banners of muslin curtains out of wide windows, and little
gardens of palms in pots showed behind the balustrades of the flat roofs
whenever a story ran short. Everywhere was a subtle contagion of
momentary well-being, a sense of lifted burden. The stucco streets were
too slovenly to be purely joyous, but a warm satisfaction brooded in
them, the pariahs blinked at one genially, there was a note of cheer
even in the cheeling of the kites where they sat huddled on the
roof-cornices or circled against the high blue sky. It was enjoyable to
be abroad, in the brushing fellowship of the pavements, in touch with
brown humility, half-clad and going afoot, since even brown humility
seemed well affected t