him. This was a difficulty. He faced it.
This was the scene she had deftly been leading up to. Let her have
it out and he would tell her straight, once and for all. "What is
your point?" he repeated. "You want me to come back--go through the
same business all over again?"

"No!"

Now he was puzzled. His eyes frowned straight into hers.

"Then what? Come along, Sally, out with it."

She turned her head away. He heard the sound in her throat as she
began to form the words. But she could not say it. Then her hands
covered her face, for a moment stayed there; at last she took them
away and met the beating gaze of his eyes.

"If I had a child," she said quickly.

His forehead creased, line upon line. He took a deep breath and leant
back in his chair.

"What do you mean?" he asked.

"If I had a child," she repeated, "I shouldn't be lonely then. I
should have some one to do all these things for then. I should have
something to live for."

Traill stood abruptly to his feet. "You're--you're crazy!" he
exclaimed.

She stood beside him. Her hand stretched out nervously, touching his
coat.

"No, no, I'm not. I mean it. Can't you see what it would mean to me,
here alone, night after night, night after night, no one, absolutely
no one but myself."

He studied her in amazement. "If it were any other woman than you,"
he said suddenly, "I should think this was a put-up job to compromise
me--a cunning, put-up job. But you! It's amazing! I don't understand
it. Why, you'd brand yourself to the whole world. It'd be a mill stone
round your neck, not a child."

"Don't you think I'm branded plainly enough already? What do you
think a man like Devenish thinks of me?"

"Oh, Devenish be damned! There are other men than Devenish in the
world. Men who know nothing; men who'd be ready to marry you."

"Yes, I found one--one who thought me everything--everything till
I told him."

"You told him?"

"Yes."

"In the name of God, what for? You must be crazy. What the deuce did
you want to tell him for?"

"It was the only fair thing to do," she said quietly.

"Fair? Rot! That's chucking your chances away. That's playing the
fool! What's he got to do with your life before you met him?" This
was flinging the blame at him.

"Would you rather that the woman you were going to marry kept silent,
risked your not finding out afterwards? Would you think she'd treated
you fairly if she said nothing, and you were to discover it when it