said nothing at all; he put his arm on the
mantel and stared at the wall, while Jennie waited, not knowing what
would follow--not wishing to make a single plea. The clock ticked
audibly. Lester's face betrayed no sign of either thought or feeling.
He was now quite calm, quite sober, wondering what he should do.
Jennie was before him as the criminal at the bar. He, the righteous,
the moral, the pure of heart, was in the judgment seat. Now to
sentence her--to make up his mind what course of action he should
pursue.

It was a disagreeable tangle, to be sure, something that a man of
his position and wealth really ought not to have anything to do with.
This child, the actuality of it, put an almost unbearable face upon
the whole matter--and yet he was not quite prepared to speak. He
turned after a time, the silvery tinkle of the French clock on the
mantel striking three and causing him to become aware of Jennie, pale,
uncertain, still standing as she had stood all this while.

"Better go to bed," he said at last, and fell again to pondering
this difficult problem.

But Jennie continued to stand there wide-eyed, expectant, ready to
hear at any moment his decision as to her fate. She waited in vain,
however. After a long time of musing he turned and went to the
clothes-rack near the door.

"Better go to bed," he said, indifferently. "I'm going out."

She turned instinctively, feeling that even in this crisis there
was some little service that she might render, but he did not see her.
He went out, vouchsafing no further speech.

She looked after him, and as his footsteps sounded on the stair she
felt as if she were doomed and hearing her own death-knell. What had
she done? What would he do now? She stood there a dissonance of
despair, and when the lower door clicked moved her hand out of the
agony of her suppressed hopelessness.

"Gone!" she thought. "Gone!"

In the light of a late dawn she was still sitting there pondering,
her state far too urgent for idle tears.

CHAPTER XXX

The sullen, philosophic Lester was not so determined upon his
future course of action as he appeared to be. Stern as was his mood,
he did not see, after all, exactly what grounds he had for complaint.
And yet the child's existence complicated matters considerably. He did
not like to see the evidence of Jennie's previous misdeeds walking
about in the shape of a human being; but, as a matter of fact, he
admitted to himself that long