She reached St. John’s Square, and paused at length by a door on which was the inscription:  ‘H.  Lewis, Working Jeweller.’  It was just possible that the men had already left; she waited for several minutes with anxious mind.  No; the door opened, and two workmen came forth.  Jane’s eagerness impelled her to address one of them.

‘Please, sir, Mr. Kirkwood hasn’t gone yet, has he?’

‘No, he ain’t,’ the man answered pleasantly; and turning back, he called to some one within the doorway; ’Hello, Sidney! here’s your sweetheart waiting for you.’

Jane shrank aside; but in a moment she saw a familiar figure; she advanced again, and eagerly delivered her message.

‘All right, Jane!  I’ll walk on with you,’ was the reply.  And whilst the other two men were laughing good-naturedly, Kirkwood strode away by the girl’s side.  He seemed to be absent-minded, and for some hundred yards’ distance was silent; then he stopped of a sudden and looked down at his companion.

‘Why, Jane,’ he said, ’you’ll get your death, running about in weather like this.’  He touched her dress.  ’I thought so; you’re wet through.’

There followed an inarticulate growl, and immediately he stripped off his short overcoat.

‘Here, put this on, right over your head.  Do as I tell you, child!’

He seemed impatient to-night.  Wasn’t he going to talk with her as before?  Jane felt her heart sinking.  With her hunger for kind and gentle words, she thought nothing of the character of the night, and that Sidney Kirkwood might reasonably be anxious to get over the ground as quickly as possible.

‘How is Mrs. Hewett?’ Sidney asked, when they were walking on again.  ‘Still poorly, eh?  And the baby?’

Then he was again mute.  Jane had something she wished to say to him—­wished very much indeed, yet she felt it would have been difficult even if he had encouraged her.  As he kept silence and walked so quickly, speech on her part was utterly forbidden.  Kirkwood, however, suddenly remembered that his strides were disproportionate to the child’s steps.  She was an odd figure thus disguised in his over-jacket; he caught a glimpse of her face by a street lamp, and smiled, but with a mixture of pain.

‘Feel a bit warmer so?’ he asked.

‘Oh yes, sir.’

‘Haven’t you got a jacket, Jane?’

‘It’s all to pieces, sir.  They’re goin’ to have it mended, I think.’

‘They’ was the word by which alone Jane ventured to indicate her aunt.

‘Going to, eh?  I think they’d better be quick about it.’

Ha! that was the old tone of kindness!  How it entered into her blood and warmed it!  She allowed herself one quick glance at him.

‘Do I walk too quick for you?’

‘Oh no, sir.  Mr. Kirkwood, please, there’s something I—­’

The sentence had, as it were, begun itself, but timidity cut it short.  Sidney stopped and looked at her.