The dark-haired woman was still ably answering the chaff of Nini and the Germans. And her face was not the face she had shewn to Betty. Betty came quietly behind her and touched her shoulder. She leapt in her chair and turned white under the rouge.

"What the devil!—You shouldn't do that!" she said roughly; "You frightened me out of my wits."

"I'm so sorry," said Betty, who was pale too. "Come away, won't you? I want to talk to you."

"Your little friend is charming," said one of the men in thick German-French. "May I order for her a bock or a cerises?"

"Do come," she urged.

"Let's walk," she said. "What's the matter? Where's young Temple? Don't tell me he's like all the others."

"He meant to be kind," said Betty, "but he asked a lot of questions, and I don't want to know him. I like you better. Isn't there anywhere we can be quiet, and talk? I'm all alone here in Paris, and I do want help. And I'd rather you'd help me than anyone else. Can't I come home with you?"

"No you can't."

"Well then, will you come with me?—not to the hotel he told me of, but to some other—you must know of one."

"What will you do if I don't?"

"I don't know," said Betty very forlornly, "but you will, won't you. You don't know how tired I am. Come with me, and then in the morning we can talk. Do—do."

The other woman took some thirty or forty steps in silence. Then she asked abruptly:

"Have you plenty of money?"

"Yes, lots."

"And you're an artist?"

"Yes—at least I'm a student."

Again the woman reflected. At last she shrugged her shoulders and laughed. "Set a thief to catch a thief," she said. "I shall make a dragon of a chaperon, I warn you. Yes, I'll come, just for this one night, but you'll have to pay the hotel bill."

"Of course," said Betty.

"This is an adventure! Where's your luggage?"

"It's at the station, but I want you to promise not to tell that Temple man a word about me. I don't want to see him again. Promise."

"Queer child. But I'll promise. Now look here: if I go into a thing at all I go into it heart and soul; so let's do the thing properly. We must have some luggage. I've got an old portmanteau knocking about. Will you wait for me somewhere while I get it?"

"I'd rather not," said Betty, remembering the Germans and Nini.

"Well then,—there'd be no harm for a few minutes. You can come with me. This is really rather a lark!"

Five minutes' walking brought the two to a dark house. The woman rang a bell; a latch clicked and a big door swung open. She grasped Betty's hand.

"Don't say a word," she said, and pulled her through.

It was very dark.

The other woman called out a name as they passed the door of the concierge, a name that was not Conway, and her hand pulled Betty up flight after flight of steep stairs. On the fifth floor she opened a door with a key, and left Betty standing at the threshold till she had lighted a lamp.

Then "Come in," she said, and shut the door and bolted it.

The room was small and smelt of white rose scent; the looking-glass had a lace drapery fastened up with crushed red roses; and there were voluminous lace and stuff curtains to bed and window.

"Sit down," said the hostess. She took off her hat and pulled the scarlet flowers from it. She washed her face till it shewed no rouge and no powder, and the brown of lashes and brows was free from the black water-paint. She raked under the bed with a faded sunshade till she found an old brown portmanteau. Her smart black and white dress was changed for a black one, of a mode passée these three years. A gray chequered golf cape and the dulled hat completed the transformation.

"How nice you look," said Betty.

The other bundled some linen and brushes into the portmanteau.

"The poor old Gladstone's very thin still," she said, and folded skirts; "we must plump it out somehow."

When the portmanteau was filled and strapped, they carried it down between them, in the dark, and got it out on to the pavement.

"I am Miss Conway now," said the woman, "and we will drive to the Hotel de Lille. I went there one Easter with my father."

With the change in her dress a change had come over Miss Conway's voice.

At the Hotel de Lille it was she who ordered the two rooms, communicating, for herself and her cousin, explained where the rest of the luggage was, and gave orders for the morning chocolate.

"This is very jolly," said Betty, when they were alone. "It's like an elopement."

"Exactly," said Miss Conway. "Good night."

"It's rather like a dream, though. I shan't wake up and find you gone, shall I?" Betty asked anxiously.

"No, no. We've all your affairs to settle in the morning."

"And yours?"

"Mine were settled long ago. Oh, I forgot—I'm Miss Conway, at the Hotel de Lille. Yes, we'll settle my affairs in the morning, too. Good night, little girl."

"Good night, Miss Conway."

"They call me Lotty."

"My name's Betty and—look here, I can't wait till the morning." Betty clasped her hands, and seemed to be holding her courage between them. "I've come to Paris to study art, and I want you to come and live with me. I know you'd like it, and I've got heaps of money—will you?"

She spoke quickly and softly, and her face was flushed and her eyes bright.

There was a pause.

"You silly little duffer—you silly dear little duffer."

The other woman had turned away and was fingering the chains of an ormolu candlestick on the mantelpiece.

Betty put an arm over her shoulders.

"Look here," she said, "I'm not such a duffer as you think. I know people do dreadful things—but they needn't go on doing them, need they?"

"Yes, they need," said the other; "that's just it."

Her fingers were still twisting the bronze chains.

"And the women you talked about—in the Bible—they weren't kind and good, like you; they were just only horrid and not anything else. You told me to be good. Won't you let me help you? Oh, it does seem such cheek of me, but I never knew anyone before who—I don't know how to say it. But I am so sorry, and I want you to be good, just as much as you want me to. Dear, dear Lotty!"

"My name's Paula."

"Paula dear, I wish I wasn't so stupid, but I know it's not your fault, and I know you aren't like that woman with the Germans."

"I should hope not indeed," Paula was roused to flash back; "dirty little French gutter-cat."

"I've never been a bit of good to anyone," said Betty, adding her other arm and making a necklace of the two round Paula's neck, "except to Parishioners perhaps. Do let me be a bit of good to you. Don't you think I could?"

"You dear little fool!" said Paula gruffly.

"Yes, but say yes—you must! I know you want to. I've got lots of money. Kiss me, Paula."

"I won't!—Don't kiss me!—I won't have it! Go away," said the woman, clinging to Betty and returning her kisses.

"Don't cry," said Betty gently. "We shall be ever so happy. You'll see. Good night, Paula. Do you know I've never had a friend—a girl-friend, I mean?"

"For God's sake hold your tongue, and go to bed! Good night."

Betty, alone, faced at last, and for the first time, The Thought. But it had changed its dress when Miss Conway changed hers. It was no longer a Thought: it was a Resolution.

Twin-born with her plan for saving her new friend was the plan for a life that should not be life at Long Barton.

All the evening she had refused to face The Thought. But it had been shaping itself to something more definite than thought. As a Resolution, a Plan, it now unrolled itself before her. She sat in the stiff arm-chair looking straight in front of her, and she saw what she meant to do. The Thought had been wise not to insist too much on recognition. Earlier in the evening it would have seemed merely a selfish temptation. Now it was an opportunity for a good and noble act. And Betty had always wanted so much to be noble and good.

Here she was in Paris, alone. Her aunt, train-borne, was every moment further and further away. As for her step-father:

"I hate him," said Betty, "and he hates me. He only let me come to get rid of me. And what good could I do at Long Barton compared with what I can do here? Any one can do Parish work. I've got the money Aunt left for Madame Gautier. Perhaps it's stealing. But is it? The money was meant to pay to keep me in Paris to study Art. And it's not as if I were staying altogether for selfish reasons—there's Paula. I'm sure she has really a noble nature. And it's not as if I were staying because He is in Paris. Of course, that would be really wrong. But he said he was going to Vienna. I suppose his uncle delayed him, but he'll certainly go. I'm sure it's right. I've learned a lot since I left home. I'm not a child now. I'm a woman, and I must do what I think is right. You know I must, mustn't I?&............