ddressing envelopes from nine till six. It would be better,
surely it would be better, to be what people call bad!"

Rose watched the flushed face. "If a life of that sort would give you
any pleasure," she spoke slowly, "I should say live it by all means. The
trouble is, it would not please you. If you care to listen, I will tell
you a bit of my own story. It is not altogether pleasant, but in your
present frame of mind it will not do you any harm to hear it."

She paused a moment, head thrown back, blowing smoke-rings to the
ceiling.

"I came to London ten years ago," she began presently, "and I was
twenty-one at the time. I had been keeping house for a brother in India,
and I had had a good time, but a spirit of restlessness had come upon me
and I would not leave him alone till he let me come home and start on my
own. I had, of course, no people. Poor brother, he gave way after many
arguments, knowing as little as I did about the life here, and I came.
He died the year afterwards of enteric. I had been on an allowance from
him before, but when he died that stopped and I was left absolutely
penniless. You have had a bad time in that way, but I had a worse one.
Still I was young and strong, and, above all, I was a fighter, so I won
through. I got a post as typist in a city office and I drifted to
Shamrock House. My working hours were lengthy, sometimes it was after
half-past seven before I came out of office. Then I would hurry through
the crowded streets, as you do now, and always that walk, through gaily
lighted pleasure-seeking crowds, would end for me in the dark dreariness
where Great Smith Street turns away from Victoria Street, a ten-minute
walk through one of London's poorest neighbourhoods, and--Shamrock
House! Those were the days in which I did my hardest kicking against
fate; it was so unjust, so unfair, and all the while youth and power to
enjoy, which is the heritage of youth, were slipping past me. That is
how you feel, isn't it?" she asked suddenly.

"Yes," Joan said.

"I know," Rose answered softly; "well, wait and hear. I was in this
mood, and feeling more than usually desperate, when I met the woman. I
need not give her a name, not even to you; I doubt if I ever knew her
real one. I had seen her several times, perhaps she had noticed me,
though she had quaint, unseeing eyes that appeared to gaze through you
blankly. She was a beautiful woman with an arresting beauty hard to
define, and she used, a