waiting. Wasn't I silly?" And
Mary Ann laughed a little laugh with tears in it. Then growing grave
again, she added: "And at last, when mother was really on the point of
death, she forgot all about little Sally, and said she was going to
meet Tom. And I remember thinking she was going to America. I didn't
know people talk nonsense before they die."

"They do--a great deal of it, unfortunately," said Lancelot lightly,
trying to disguise from himself that his eyes were moist. He seemed to
realise now what she was--a child; a child who, simpler than most
children to start with, had grown only in body, whose soul had been
stunted by uncounted years of dull and monotonous drudgery. The blood
burnt in his veins as he thought of the cruelty of circumstance and the
heartless honesty of her mistress. He made up his mind for the second
time to give Mrs. Leadbatter a piece of his mind in the morning.

"Well, go to bed now, my poor child," he said, "or you'll get no rest
at all."

"Yessir."

She went obediently up a couple of stairs, then turned her head
appealingly towards him. The tears still glimmered on her eyelashes.
For an instant he thought she was expecting her kiss, but she only
wanted to explain anxiously once again, "That was why I liked that
song, 'Kiss me, good-night, dear love.' It was what my mother----"

"Yes, yes, I understand," he broke in, half amused, though somehow the
words did not seem so full of maudlin pathos to him now. "And
there----"--he drew her head towards him--"Kiss _me_, good-night----"

He did not complete the quotation; indeed, her lips were already drawn
too close to his. But, ere he released her, the long-repressed thought
had found expression.

"You don't kiss anybody but me?" he said half playfully.

"Oh no, sir," said Mary Ann earnestly.

"What!" more lightly still. "Haven't you got half a dozen young men?"

Mary Ann shook her head, more regretfully than resentfully. "I told
you I never go out--except for little errands."

She had told him, but his attention had been so concentrated on the
ungrammatical form in which she had conveyed the information, that the
fact itself had made no impression. Now his anger against Mrs.
Leadbatter dwindled. After all, she was wise in not giving Mary Ann
the run of the London streets.

"But"--he hesitated. "How about the--the milkman--and the--the other
gentlemen."

"Please, sir," said Mary Ann, "I don't like them."

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