the caution, the worldly tact, which an elder,
wiser, and colder man might have summoned to
help him in this strange emergency.

"You may trust me for any harmless
purpose," I said. "If it troubles you to explain
your strange situation to me, don't think of
returning to the subject again. I have no right
to ask you for any explanations. Tell me how
I can help you; and if I can, I will."

"You are very kind, and I am very, very
thankful to have met you." The first touch of
womanly tenderness that I had heard from her,
trembled in her voice as she said the words;
but no tears glistened in those large, wistfully
attentive eyes of hers, which were still fixed on
me. "I have only been in London once before,"
she went on, more and more rapidly; "and
I know nothing about that side of it, yonder.
Can I get a fly, or a carriage of any kind? Is
it too late? I don't know. If you could show
me where to get a fly — and if you will only
promise not to interfere with me, and to let me
leave you, when and how I please— I have a
friend in London who will be glad to receive
me— I want nothing else— will you promise?"

She looked anxiously up and down the road;
shifted her bag again from one hand to the
other; repeated the words, "Will you
promise?" and looked hard in my face, with a
pleading fear and confusion that it troubled me
to see.

What could I do? Here was a stranger
utterly and helplessly at my mercy— and that
stranger a forlorn woman. No house was near;
no one was passing whom I could consult; and
no earthly right existed on my part to give me a
power of control over her, even if I had known
how to exercise it. I trace these lines, self-
distrustfully, with the shadows of after-events
darkening the very paper I write on; and still
I say, what could I do?

What I did do, was to try and gain time by
questioning her.

"Are you sure that your friend in London
will receive you at such a late hour as this?" I
said.

"Quite sure. Only say you will let me leave
you when and how I please— only say you won't
interfere with me. Will you promise?"

As she repeated the words for the third time,
she came close to me, and laid her hand, with a
sudden gentle stealthiness, on my bosom— a
thin hand; a cold hand (when I removed it
with mine) even on that sultry night. Remember
that I was young; remember that the hand
which touched me was a woman's.

"Will you promise?"

"Yes."

One word! The little familiar word that is
on everybody's lips, every hour in the day.
Oh me! and I tremble, now, when I write it.

We set our faces towards London, and walked
on together in the first still hour of the new day
— I, and this woman, whose name, whose
character, whose story, whose objects in life, whose
very presence by my side, at that moment, were
fathomless mysteries to me. It was like a
dream. Was I Walter Hartright? Was this
the well-known, uneventful road, where holiday
people strolled on Sundays? Had I really left,
little more than an hour since, the quiet,
decent, conventionally-domestic atmosphere of my
mother's cottage? I was too bewildered— too
conscious also of a vague sense of something
like self-reproach— to speak to my strange
companion for some minutes. It was her voice
again that first broke the silence between us.

"I want to ask you something," she said,
suddenly. "Do you know many people in
London?"

"Yes, a great many."

"Many men of rank and title?" There
was an unmistakable tone of suspicion in the
strange question. I hesitated about answering it.

"Some," I said, after a moment's silence.

"Many"— she came to a full stop, and looked
me searchingly in the face— "many men of the
rank of Baronet?"

Too much astonished to reply, I questioned
her in my turn.

"Why do you ask?"

"Because I hope, for my own sake, there is
one Baronet that you don't know."

"Will you tell me his name?"

"I can't— I daren't— I forget myself, when
I mention it." She spoke loudly and almost
fiercely, raised her clenched hand in the air, and
shook it passionately; then, on a sudden,
controlled herself again, and added, in tones lowered
to a whisper: "Tell me which of them you
know."

I could hardly refuse to humour her in such
a trifle, and I mentioned three names. Two,
the names of fathers of families whose daughters
I taught; one, the name of a bachelor who had
once taken me a cruise in his yacht, to make
sketches for him.

"Ah! you don't know him," she said, with a
sigh of relief. "Are you a man of rank and
title yourself?"

"Far from it. I am only a drawing-master."

As the reply passed my lips— a little bitterly,
perhaps— she took my arm with the abruptness
which characterised all her actions.

"Not a man of rank and title," she repeated
to herself. "Thank God! I may trust him."

I had hitherto contrived to master my curiosity
out of consideration for my companion;
but it got the better of me, now.

"I am afraid you have serious reason to
complain of some man of rank and title?" I said.
"I am afraid the baronet, whose name you are
unwilling to mention to me, has done you some
grievous wrong? Is he the cause of your being
out here at this strange time of night?"

"Don't ask me; don't make me talk of it,"
she answered. "I'm not fit, now. I have been
cruelly used and cruelly wronged. You will be
kinder than ever, if you will walk on fast, and
not speak to me. I sadly want to be silent— I
sadly want to quiet myself, if I can."

We moved forward again at a quick pace;
and for half an hour, at least, not a word passed