“Not at a guinea a week.”

“Then take less.”

“But I have to pay sixteen shillings every week.”

“That doesn’t matter.”

She caught at a sob, “But to leave London—­I can’t do it, I can’t.”

“But how?—­Leave London?” Lewisham’s face changed.

“Oh! life is hard,” she said.  “I can’t.  They—­they wouldn’t let me stop in London.”

“What do you mean?”

She explained if Lagune dismissed her she was to go into the country to an aunt, a sister of Chaffery’s who needed a companion.  Chaffery insisted upon that.  “Companion they call it.  I shall be just a servant—­she has no servant.  My mother cries when I talk to her.  She tells me she doesn’t want me to go away from her.  But she’s afraid of him.  ‘Why don’t you do what he wants?’ she says.”

She sat staring in front of her at the gathering night.  She spoke again in an even tone.

“I hate telling you these things.  It is you ...  If you didn’t mind ...  But you make it all different.  I could do it—­if it wasn’t for you.  I was ...  I was helping ...  I had gone meaning to help if anything went wrong at Mr. Lagune’s.  Yes—­that night.  No ... don’t!  It was too hard before to tell you.  But I really did not feel it ... until I saw you there.  Then all at once I felt shabby and mean.”

“Well?” said Lewisham.

“That’s all.  I may have done thought-reading, but I have never really cheated since—­never....  If you knew how hard it is ...”

“I wish you had told me that before.”

“I couldn’t.  Before you came it was different.  He used to make fun of the people—­used to imitate Lagune and make me laugh.  It seemed a sort of joke.”  She stopped abruptly.  “Why did you ever come on with me?  I told you not to—­you know I did.”

She was near wailing.  For a minute she was silent.

“I can’t go to his sister’s,” she cried.  “I may be a coward—­but I can’t.”

Pause.  And then Lewisham saw his solution straight and clear.  Suddenly his secret desire had become his manifest duty.

“Look here,” he said, not looking at her and pulling his moustache.  “I won’t have you doing any more of that damned cheating.  You shan’t soil yourself any more.  And I won’t have you leaving London.”

“But what am I to do?” Her voice went up.

“Well—­there is one thing you can do.  If you dare.”

“What is it?”

He made no answer for some seconds.  Then he turned round and sat looking at her.  Their eyes met....

The grey of his mind began to colour.  Her face was white and she was looking at him, in fear and perplexity.  A new tenderness for her sprang up in him—­a new feeling.  Hitherto he had loved and desired her sweetness and animation—­but now she was white and weary-eyed.  He felt as though he had forgotten her and suddenly remembered.  A great longing came into his mind.