"If you will give me her name, and tell me where to find her, I will see
that she is provided for."
"She is provided for."
"How?"
"I am keeping on the house for her."
Anne's face flushed.
"What house?"
"A farm, out in the country."
"That house is yours? You were living with her there?"
"Yes."
Her face hardened. She was thinking of her dead child, who was to have
gone into the country to get strong.
He was tortured by the same thought. Maggie, his mistress, had grown fat
and rosy in the pure air of Holderness. Peggy had died in Scale.
In her bitterness she turned on him.
"And what guarantee have I that you will not go to her again?"
"My word. Isn't that sufficient?"
"I don't know, Walter. It would have been once. It isn't now. What proof
have I of your honour?"
"My--"
"I beg your pardon. I forgot. A man's honour and a woman's honour are two
very different things."
"They are both things that are usually taken for granted, and not
mentioned."
"I will try to take it for granted. You must forgive my having mentioned
it. There is one thing I must know. Has she--that woman--any children?"
"She has none."
Up till that moment, the examination had been conducted with the coolness
of intense constraint. But for her one burst of feeling, Anne had
sustained her tone of business-like inquiry, her manner of the woman of
committees. Now, as she asked her question, her voice shook with the
beating of her heart. Majendie, as he answered, heard her draw a long,
deep breath of relief.
"And you propose to keep on this house for her?" she said calmly.
"Yes. She has settled in there, and she will be well looked after."
"Who will look after her?"
"The Pearsons. They're people I can trust."
"And, besides the house, I suppose you will give her money?"
"I _must_ make her a small allowance."
"That is a very unwise arrangement. Whatever help is given her had much
better come from me."
"From _you_?"
"From a woman. It will be the best safeguard for the girl."
He saw her drift and smiled.
"Am I to understand that you propose to rescue her?"
"It's my duty--my work."
"Your work?"
"You may not realise it; but that is the work I've been doing for the
last three years. I am doubly responsible for a girl who has suffered
through my husband's fault."
"What do you want to do with her?"
"I want, if possible, to reclaim her."
He smiled again.
"Do you realise what sort of
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