Kitty saw Felix sway for an instant, and was about to put out a protecting hand when he turned again to the lieutenant.

“Officer, I do not ask you to break your rules, but I would consider it an especial favor if you would let me see this woman for a moment—­even if you do not permit me to speak to her.”

“Well, you can’t see her.”  The reply came with some positiveness and a slight touch of irony.  He had made up his mind now that if the speaker had a pull, he would meet it by keeping strictly to the regulations.

“Why not?”

“Because she ain’t here.  She’s in the Tombs by this time, unless somebody went her bail up at court.  They had her in the patrol-wagon as I come on duty.”

“The Tombs?  That is the city prison, is it not?” Felix asked, hardly conscious of his own question, absorbed only in one thought—­Lady Barbara’s degradation.

“That’s what it is,” answered the lieutenant with a contemptuous glance at Felix, followed by a curl of the lip.  No man had a pull who asked a question like that.

“If I went there, could I see her?”

“When?”

“This afternoon.”

“Nothin’ doin’—­too late.  You might work it to-morrow.  Step down to headquarters, they’ll tell you.  If she’s up for felony it means five years and them kind ain’t easy to see.  Can I do anything more for you?”

“No,” said Felix firmly.

“Well, then, move on, both of you—­you can’t block up the desk.”

Felix turned and left the station-house, Kitty following in silence, her heart torn for the man beside her.  Never had he seemed finer to her than at this moment; never had her own heart stirred with greater loyalty.  But never since she had known him had she seen him so shaken.

“There is nothing more we can do to-day,” he said, speaking evenly, almost coldly, when they reached the corner of the street.  “I will see Father Cruse to-night and tell him of your kindness, and he can decide as to what is to be done.  And if you do not mind, I will leave you.”

She stood and watched him as he disappeared in the throng.  She understood her dismissal and was not offended.  It was not her secret and she had no right to interfere or even to advise.  When he was ready he would tell her.  Until that time she would wait with her hands held out.

Felix crossed the street, halted for an instant as if uncertain as to his course, and turned toward the river.  He wanted to be alone, and the crowd gave him a greater sense of isolation.  It was the first time in months that he had tramped the thoroughfares without some definite object in view.  All that was now a thing of the past, never to be revived.  His quest was finished.  The interview with the sergeant had ended it all.  Every item in his detailed account of the woman now in the Tombs tallied with Kitty’s description of the woman with the sleeve-buttons and so on, in turn, with the woman who was once his wife.