“I’ve sent for you so that I could settle things up.”

“Your father’s affairs?  Can’t I do it better?”

“He had arranged everything.  There are only the papers—­his notes—­and he wrote out the addresses of the men they were to be sent to.  No, I mean settle things up with you.”

“You mustn’t bother about that,” said he.  “Besides, there’s nothing to settle.”

“I shan’t pretend I’m going to try to pay you back,” she went on, as if he had not spoken.  “I never could do it.  But you will get part at least by selling this furniture and the things at the laboratory.”

“Dorothy—­please,” he implored.  “Don’t you understand you’re to stay on here, just the same?  What sort of man do you think I am?  I did this for you, and you know it.”

“But I did it for my father,” replied she, “and he’s gone.”  She was resting her melancholy gaze upon him.  “I couldn’t take anything from you.  You didn’t think I was that kind?”

He was silent.

“I cared nothing about the scandal—­what people said—­so long as I was doing it for him. . . .  I’d have done anything for him.  Sometimes I thought you were going to compel me to do things I’d have hated to do.  I hope I wronged you, but I feared you meant that.”  She sat thinking several minutes, sighed wearily.  “It’s all over now.  It doesn’t matter.  I needn’t bother about it any more.”

“Dorothy, let’s not talk of these things now,” said Norman.  “There’s no hurry.  I want you to wait until you are calm and have thought everything over.  Then I’m sure you’ll see that you ought to stay on.”

“How could I?” she asked wonderingly.

“Why not?  Am I demanding anything of you?  You know I’m not—­and that I never shall.”

“But there’s no reason on earth why you should support me.  I can work.  Why shouldn’t I?  And if I didn’t, if I stayed on here, what sort of woman would I be?”

He was unable to find an answer.  He was trying not to see a look in her face—­or was it in her soul, revealed through her eyes?—­a look that made him think for the first time of a resemblance between her and her father.

“You see yourself I’ve got to go.  Any money I could earn wouldn’t more than pay for a room and board somewhere.”

“You can let me advance you money while you—­” He hesitated, had an idea which he welcomed eagerly—­“while you study for the stage.  Yes, that’s the sensible thing.  You can learn to act.  Then you will be able to make a decent living.”

She slowly shook her head.  “I’ve no talent for it—­and no liking.  No, Mr. Norman, I must go back to work—­and right away.”

“But at least wait until you’ve looked into the stage business,” he urged.  “You may find that you like it and that you have talent for it.”

“I can’t take any more from you,” she said.

“You think I am not to be trusted.  I’m not going to say now how I feel toward you.  But I can honestly say one thing.  Now that you are all alone and unprotected, you needn’t have the least fear of me.”