“I’d been given an address, but I lost it on the way.  I described you to the station master and asked if he could help me.  He remembered a lady answering your description having a box sent to an address in Pimlico.  When I told him you were a missing relative, he turned it up.”

“Why didn’t you call?”

“I didn’t know if you were Mrs Kenrick, and, if you were, how you would take my ‘nosing’ into your affairs.”

“Why did you bother?”

“I always liked you, and when I feared you’d got into a scrape for love of a man, my heart went out to you and I wanted to help you.”

Mavis bent over to kiss her friend before saying:  “I only hope I live to do you a good turn.”

“You’ve done it already by making friends with me.  But isn’t Hunter a pig?”

“I hate her,” said Mavis emphatically.

“She tried to get my time for her holidays, but it’s now arranged that she goes away when I get back.”

“Where is she going?” asked Mavis absently.

“Cornwall.”

“Cornwall?  Which part?”

“South, I believe.  Why?”

“Curiosity,” replied Mavis.

Then Miss Toombs told Mavis the rest of the Melkbridge news.  She learned how Mr and Mrs Trivett had given up Pennington Farm and were now living in Melkbridge, where Miss Toombs had heard that they had a hard struggle to get along.  Miss Toombs mentioned several other names well known to Mavis; but she did not speak of Charlie Perigal.

It was a long time before Mavis slept that night.  She had long and earnestly thanked her Heavenly Father for having sent kindly Miss Toombs to help her in her distress.  She then lay awake for quite a long while, wondering why Miss Toombs had been against her going to Melkbridge.  Vague, intangible fears hovered about her, which were associated with her lover and his many promises to marry her.  He also was at Melkbridge.  Mavis tried to persuade herself that Miss Toombs’s objection to her going to the same place could have nothing in common with the fact of her lover’s presence there.

The next morning, while the two friends were breakfasting, Mavis again spoke of the matter.

“I can’t make out why you were so against my going to Melkbridge,” she said.

“Have you been worrying about it?” asked Miss Toombs.

“Yes.  Is there any reason why I shouldn’t go back?”

“You great big silly!  The reason why I didn’t want you to go there is because I might get you a better job in town.”

“But you told me last night you were friendless.  Friendless girls can’t get others work in town.  So don’t try and get over me by saying that.”

Miss Toombs explained how the manager of a London house, which had extensive dealings with Devitt’s boot factory, was indebted to her for certain crooked business ways that she had made straight.  She told Mavis that she had gone to see this man on Mr Devitt’s behalf since she had been in town, and that he was anxious to keep in her good books.  She thought that a word from her would get Mavis employment.