e had
been oppressed by dire poverty. He remembered the luncheon they had eaten
together when first he came to Paris and the ghoulish appetite which had
disgusted him: he realised now that she ate in that manner because she was
ravenous. The concierge told him what her food had consisted of. A
bottle of milk was left for her every day and she brought in her own loaf
of bread; she ate half the loaf and drank half the milk at mid-day when
she came back from the school, and consumed the rest in the evening. It
was the same day after day. Philip thought with anguish of what she must
have endured. She had never given anyone to understand that she was poorer
than the rest, but it was clear that her money had been coming to an end,
and at last she could not afford to come any more to the studio. The
little room was almost bare of furniture, and there were no other clothes
than the shabby brown dress she had always worn. Philip searched among her
things for the address of some friend with whom he could communicate. He
found a piece of paper on which his own name was written a score of times.
It gave him a peculiar shock. He supposed it was true that she had loved
him; he thought of the emaciated body, in the brown dress, hanging from
the nail in the ceiling; and he shuddered. But if she had cared for him
why did she not let him help her? He would so gladly have done all he
could. He felt remorseful because he had refused to see that she looked
upon him with any particular feeling, and now these words in her letter
were infinitely pathetic: I can't bear the thought that anyone else should
touch me. She had died of starvation.

Philip found at length a letter signed: your loving brother, Albert. It
was two or three weeks old, dated from some road in Surbiton, and refused
a loan of five pounds. The writer had his wife and family to think of, he
didn't feel justified in lending money, and his advice was that Fanny
should come back to London and try to get a situation. Philip telegraphed
to Albert Price, and in a little while an answer came:

"Deeply distressed. Very awkward to leave my business. Is presence
essential. Price."

Philip wired a succinct affirmative, and next morning a stranger presented
himself at the studio.

"My name's Price," he said, when Philip opened the door.

He was a commonish man in black with a band round his bowler hat; he had
something of Fanny's clumsy look; he wore a stubbly moustache, and had a
co