Lorry smiled.  “Yes, but she don’t know it,” he replied.  “I used to do all her collecting for her.  When the Wilmots quit paying, I paid for ’em—­out of money I made at odd jobs.  I paid for ’em for over two years.  Then, one evening—­Estelle Wilmot”—­Lorry paused before this name, lingered on it, paused after it—­“said to me—­she waylaid me at the back gate—­I always had to go in and out by the alley way—­no wash by the front gate for them!  Anyhow, she stopped me and said—­all red and nervous—­’You mustn’t come for the wash any more.’

“‘Why not?’ says I.  ‘Is the family complaining?’

“‘No,’ says she, ‘but we owe you for two years.’

“‘What makes you think that?’ said I, astonished and pretty badly scared for the minute.

“‘I’ve kept account,’ she said.  And she was fiery red.  ’I keep a list of all we owe, so as to have it when we’re able to pay.’”

“What a woman she is!” exclaimed Arthur.  “I suppose she’s putting by out of the profits of that little millinery store of hers to pay off the family debts.  I hear she’s doing well.”

“A smashing business,” replied Lorry, in a tone that made Arthur glance quickly at him.  “But, as I was saying, I being a young fool and frightened out of my wits, said to her:  ’You don’t owe mother a cent, Miss Estelle.  It’s all been settled—­except a few weeks lately.  I’m collectin’, and I ought to know.’

“I ain’t much of a hand at lying, and she saw straight through me.  I guess what was going on in her head helped her, for she looked as if she was about to faint.  ‘It’s mighty little for me to do, to get to see you,’ I went on.  ’It’s my only chance.  Your people would never let me in at the front gate.  And seeing you is the only thing I care about.’  Then I set down the washbasket and, being desperate, took courage and looked straight at her.  ‘And,’ said I, ’I’ve noticed that for the last year you always make a point of being on hand to give me the wash.’”

Somehow a lump came in Arthur’s throat just then.  He gave his Hercules-like friend a tremendous clap on the knee.  “Good for you, Lorry!” he cried. “That was the talk!”

“It was,” replied Lorry.  “Well, she got red again, where she had been white as a dogwood blossom, and she hung her head.  ’You don’t deny it, do you?’ said I. She didn’t make any answer.  ’It wasn’t altogether to ask me how I was getting on with my college course, was it, Miss Estelle?’ And she said ‘No’ so low that I had to guess at it.”

Lorry suspended his story.  He and Arthur sat looking at the moon.  Finally Arthur asked, rather huskily, “Is that the end, Lorry?”

Lorry’s keen, indolent face lit up with an absent and tender smile.  “That was the end of the beginning,” replied he.

Arthur thrilled and resisted a feminine instinct to put his arm round his friend.  “I don’t know which of you is the luckier,” he said.

Lorry laughed.  “You’re always envying me my good disposition,” he went on.  “Now, I’ve given away the secret of it.  Who isn’t happy when he’s got what he wants—­heaven without the bother of dying first?  I drop into her store two evenings a week to see her.  I can’t stay long or people would talk.  Then I see her now and again—­other places.  We have to be careful—­mighty careful.”