“You don’t mean to say you doubt it?” he cried, flushing up, and evidently regarding me as a hopeless cynic.  “I do assure you, Dr. Cumberledge, the poor child—­though miles, of course, below Miss Tepping’s level—­is as innocent, and as good—­”

“As a flower in May.  Oh, yes; I don’t doubt it.  How did you come to propose to her, though?”

He reddened a little.  “Well, it was almost accidental,” he said, sheepishly.  “I called there one evening, and her mother had a headache and went up to bed.  And when we two were left alone, Sissie talked a great deal about her future and how hard her life was.  And after a while she broke down and began to cry.  And then—­”

I cut him short with a wave of my hand.  “You need say no more,” I put in, with a sympathetic face.  “We have all been there.”

We paused a moment, while I puffed smoke at the photograph again.  “Well,” I said at last, “her face looks to me really simple and nice.  It is a good face.  Do you see her often?”

“Oh, no; she’s on tour.”

“In the provinces?”

“M’yes; just at present, at Scarborough.”

“But she writes to you?”

“Every day.”

“Would you think it an unpardonable impertinence if I made bold to ask whether it would be possible for you to show me a specimen of her letters?”

He unlocked a drawer and took out three or four.  Then he read one through, carefully.  “I don’t think,” he said, in a deliberative voice, “it would be a serious breach of confidence in me to let you look through this one.  There’s really nothing in it, you know—­ just the ordinary average every-day love-letter.”

I glanced through the little note.  He was right.  The conventional hearts and darts epistle.  It sounded nice enough:  “Longing to see you again; so lonely in this place; your dear sweet letter; looking forward to the time; your ever-devoted Sissie.”

“That seems straight,” I answered.  “However, I am not quite sure.  Will you allow me to take it away, with the photograph?  I know I am asking much.  I want to show it to a lady in whose tact and discrimination I have the greatest confidence.”

“What, Daphne?”

I smiled.  “No, not Daphne,” I answered.  “Our friend, Miss Wade.  She has extraordinary insight.”

“I could trust anything to Miss Wade.  She is true as steel.”

“You are right,” I answered.  “That shows that you, too, are a judge of character.”

He hesitated.  “I feel a brute,” he cried, “to go on writing every day to Sissie Montague—­and yet calling every day to see Miss Tepping.  But still—­I do it.”

I grasped his hand.  “My dear fellow,” I said, “nearly ninety per cent. of men, after all—­are human!”

I took both letter and photograph back with me to Nathaniel’s.  When I had gone my rounds that night, I carried them into Hilda Wade’s room and told her the story.  Her face grew grave.  “We must be just,” she said at last.  “Daphne is deeply in love with him; but even for Daphne’s sake, we must not take anything for granted against the other lady.”