“Look, Geoff—­you remember—­only this morning!” Very gently he raised a corner of the tarpaulin and as he looked down, Ravenslee’s breath caught suddenly.

A woman’s face, very young and very placid-seeming!  The long, dark hair framing the waxen features still oozed drops of water like great, slow-falling tears; and beholding this pale, still face, Ravenslee knew why he had shivered and hushed voice and step, and instinctively he bowed his uncovered head.

“You remember Maggie Finlay, Geoff, this morning, on the stairs?  She—­she kissed me good-by, said she was goin’ away; this is what she meant—­the river, Geoff!  She’s drowned herself, Geoff!  Oh, my God!” and letting fall the tarpaulin, Spike was shaken suddenly by fierce hysterical sobbing; whereat the man, looking up from his writing, spoke harsh-voiced.

“Aw, quit it, Kid, quit it!  Here I’ve just wrote down three rings, and she’s only got one, an’ that a cheap fake.  Shut up, Kid, you’ll make me drop blots next!  Cut it out, it ain’t as if she was your sister—­” Hereupon Spike started and lifted a twitching face.

“My sister!” he repeated, “my sister—­whatcher mean?  My God, Chip, Hermy could never—­come to—­that!” And shivering violently, Spike turned and stumbled out of the shack.  Once outside, Ravenslee set his long arm about him and felt the lad still trembling violently.

“Why, Spike!” said he, “buck up, old fellow!”

“Oh, Geoff, Hermy could never—­”

“No, no—­of course not!” So very silently, together and side by side, they crossed the narrow causeway.

“Gee, but I’m cold!” said the boy between chattering teeth as they turned along the wide avenue, “I—­I guess it’s shook me some, Geoff.  Y’ see, I used to go to school with Maggie once—­and now—­”

Reaching Mulligan’s at last, they beheld numerous groups of whispering folk who thronged the little court, the doorway, and the hall beyond; they whispered together upon the stairs and murmured on dim landings.  But as Ravenslee and Spike, making their way through these groups, mounted upward, they found one landing very silent and deserted, a landing where was a certain battered door whose dingy panels had been wetted with the tears of a woman’s agony, had felt the yearning, heartbroken passion of a woman’s quivering lips such a very few hours ago.  Remembering which, Geoffrey Ravenslee, turning to look at this grimy door, beheld it vague and blurred and indistinct as he turned and climbed that much-trodden stair.

Upon the top landing they found Mrs. Trapes, who leaned over the rails to greet them.

“So you found that b’y, Mr. Geoffrey.  Hermy’ll be glad.  You’ll have heard of poor little Maggie Finlay?  Poor lass—­poor, lonely lass!  ’T was her father drove her to it, an’ now he’s had a fit—­a stroke, the doctor’s with him now—­an’ Hermy, of course!  She’s always around where trouble is.  I guess there won’t be much rest for her to-night—­long past midnight now!  I’m glad you found that b’y.  I said you would.  I’ll jest go down and tell Hermy; she’ll be glad.”