ely uneasy, however. He had a sense of a situation being
forced on him. He knew, too, that Clayton was waiting for him at the new
plant. But Anna's trouble, absurd as its cause seemed to him, was his
responsibility.

It ceased to be absurd, however, when he saw her discolored features. It
would be some time before she could even look for another situation. Her
face was a swollen mask, and since such attraction as she had had for
him had been due to a sort of evanescent prettiness of youth, he felt a
repulsion that he tried his best to conceal.

"You poor little thing!" he said. "He's a brute. I'd like--" He clenched
his fists. "Well, I got you into it. I'm certainly going to see you
through."

She had lowered her veil quickly, and he felt easier. The telephone
booth was in the corner of a quiet hotel, and they were alone. He patted
her shoulder.

"I'll see you through," he repeated. "Don't you worry about anything.
Just lie low."

"See me through? How?"

"I can give you money; that's the least I can do. Until you are able to
work again." And as she drew away, "We'll call it a loan, if that makes
you feel better. You haven't anything, have you?"

"He has everything I've earned.. I've never had a penny except carfare."

"Poor little girl!" he said again.

She was still weak, he saw, and he led her into the deserted cafe.
He took a highball himself, not because he wanted it, but because she
refused to drink, at first. He had never before had a drink in the
morning, and he felt a warm and reckless glow to his very finger-tips.
Bending toward her, while the waiter's back was turned, he kissed her
marred and swollen cheek.

"To think I have brought you all this trouble!"

"You mustn't blame yourself."

"I do. But I'll make it up to you, Anna. You don't hate me for it, do
you?"

"Hate you! You know better than that."

"I'll come round to take you out now and then, in the evenings. I don't
want you to sit alone in that forsaken boarding-house and mope." He
drew out a bill-fold, and extracted some notes. "Don't be silly,"
he protested, as she drew back. "It's the only way I can get back my
self-respect. You owe it to me to let me do it."

She was not hard to persuade. Anything was better than going back to the
cottage on the hill, and to that heavy brooding figure, and the strap on
the wall. But the taking of the money marked a new epoch in the girl's
infatuation. It bought her. She did not know it, nor did h