oice, "that I didn't know
myself where I was going. Have you forgotten that?"

"But it wasn't true. You said it to put me off. You must know!"

"Well, I shan't tell you. There!"

"Why?"

"Because it would be the beginning of what I don't want and won't have.
Because you'd come and see me, and I shouldn't have the heart to say you
mustn't come; and in the end, if you persisted, I shouldn't have the
heart to stop you from making a fool of yourself."

"How, making a fool of myself?"

"Why, by marrying me. Now don't pretend you don't know it's true.
Marrying me would be just ruin--ruin! Oh, I know! What would your family
say, and be right in saying? That you'd been got hold of by a girl
nobody knew anything about, without any parents or friends, and who came
from nobody knew where."

"Ah, but when they knew you--"

"They'd think less of me than they did before."

"Nonsense! When they saw how beautiful you are and well educated and
refined, they wouldn't believe you came from such a place as Limehouse."

Carrie smiled.

"I seem refined to you, because you didn't expect much where you found
me. Put me beside your sisters and their friends, and I should be shy
and awkward enough. No, I will not listen, and I want you to tell the
driver to stop here."

Whether this was the point she had proposed to reach or whether she
wanted to cut short the subject, Max could not tell. But as the hansom
stopped she sprang out and led the way hurriedly in the direction of the
river. She knew her way about on this side of the river as well as on
the other, for she went straight to the water's edge, got into a boat
which was moored there with a dozen others, and, with a nod to a man
with a pipe in his mouth who was loafing near the spot, she directed Max
to jump in, and seized one oar while he took the other.

"If we go from this side," she said, "we can make sure we're not
followed, at all events."

In the darkness they began to row across the river, where the traffic
had practically ceased for the night.

Threading their way between the barges, the great steam traders, with
their ugly square hulks standing high out of the water, and the lesser
craft that clustered about the larger like a swarm of bees round the
hive, they came out upon the gray stream, slowly leaving behind one dim
shore, with its gloomy wharves and warehouses, and nearing the other.
The London lights looked dim and blurred through the mist.

As they drew