Vernon tore down the stairs three and four at a time, and caught Betty as she was stepping into a hired carriage.

"What is it?" he asked. "What's the matter?"

"Oh, go back to your friends!" said Betty angrily.

"My friends are all right. They'll amuse each other. Tell me."

"Then you must come with me," said she. "If I try to tell you here I shall begin to cry again. Don't speak to me. I can't bear it."

He got into the carriage. It was not until Betty had let herself into her room and he had followed her in—not till they stood face to face in the middle of the carpet that he spoke again.

"Now," he said, "what is it? Where's your aunt, and—"

"Sit down, won't you?" she said, pulling off her hat and throwing it on the couch; "it'll take rather a long time to tell, but I must tell you all about it, or else you can't help me. And if you don't help me I don't know what I shall do."

Despair was in her voice.

He sat down. Betty, in the chair opposite his, sat with hands nervously locked together.

"Look here," she said abruptly, "you're sure to think that everything I've done is wrong, but it's no use your saying so."

"I won't say so."

"Well, then—that day, you know, after I saw you at the Bête—Madame Gautier didn't come to fetch me, and I waited, and waited, and at last I went to her flat, and she was dead,—and I ought to have telegraphed to my step-father to fetch me, but I thought I would like to have one night in Paris first—you know I hadn't seen Paris at all, really."

"Yes," he said, trying not to let any anxiety into his voice. "Yes—go on."

"And I went to the Café d'Harcourt—What did you say?"

"Nothing."

"I thought it was where the art students went. And I met a girl there, and she was kind to me."

"What sort of a girl? Not an art student?"

"No," said Betty hardly, "she wasn't an art student. She told me what she was."

"Yes?"

"And I—I don't think I should have done it just for me alone, but—I did want to stay in Paris and work—and I wanted to help her to be good—she is good really, in spite of everything. Oh, I know you're horribly shocked, but I can't help it! And now she's gone,—and I can't find her."

"I'm not shocked," he said deliberately, "but I'm extremely stupid. How gone?"

"She was living with me here.—Oh, she found the rooms and showed me where to go for meals and gave me good advice—oh, she did everything for me! And now she's gone. And I don't know what to do. Paris is such a horrible place. Perhaps she's been kidnapped or something. And I don't know even how to tell the police. And all this time I'm talking to you is wasted time."

"It isn't wasted. But I must understand. You met this girl and she—"

"She asked your friend Mr. Temple—he was passing and she called out to him—to tell me of a decent hotel, but he asked so many questions. He gave me an address and I didn't go. I went back to her, and we went to a hotel and I persuaded her to come and live with me."

"But your aunt?"

Betty explained about her aunt.

"And your father?"

She explained about her father.

"And now she has gone, and you want to find her?"

"Want to find her?"—Betty started up and began to walk up and down the room.—"I don't care about anything else in the world! She's a dear; you don't know what a dear she is—and I know she was happy here—and now she's gone! I never had a girl friend before—what?"

Vernon had winced, just as Paula had winced, and at the same words.

"You've looked for her at the Café d'Harcourt?"

"No; I promised her that I'd never go there again."

"She seems to have given you some good advice."

"She advised me not to have anything to do with you" said Betty, suddenly spiteful.

"That was good advice—when she gave it," said Vernon, quietly; "but now it's different."

He was silent a moment, realising with a wonder beyond words how different it was. Every word, every glance between him and Betty had, hitherto, been part of a play. She had been a charming figure in a charming comedy. He had known, as it were by rote, that she had feelings—a heart, affections—but they had seemed pale, dream-like, just a delightful background to his own sensations, strong and conscious and delicate. Now for the first time he perceived her as real, a human being in the stress of a real human emotion. And he was conscious of a feeling of protective tenderness, a real, open-air primitive sentiment, with no smell of the footlights about it. He was alone with Betty. He was the only person in Paris to whom she could turn for help. What an opportunity for a fine scene in his best manner! And he found that he did not want a scene: he wanted to help her.

"Why don't you say something?" she said impatiently. "What am I to do?"

"You can't do anything. I'll do everything. You say she knows Temple. Well, I'll find him, and we'll go to her lodgings and find out if she's there. You don't know the address?"

"No," said Betty. "I went there, but it was at night and I don't even know the street."

"Now look here." He took both her hands and held them firmly. "You aren't to worry. I'll do everything. Perhaps she has been taken ill. In that case, when we find her, she'll need you to look after her. You must rest. I'm certain to find her. You must eat something. I'll send you in some dinner. And then lie down."

"I couldn't sleep," said Betty, looking at him with the eyes of a child that has cried its heart out.

"Of course you couldn't. Lie down, and make yourself read. I'll get back as soon as I can. Good-bye." There was something further that wanted to get itself said, but the words that came nearest to expressing it were "God bless you,"—and he did not say them.

On the top of his staircase he found Temple lounging.

"Hullo—still here? I'm afraid I've been a devil of a time gone, but Miss Desmond's—"

"I don't want to shove my oar in," said Temple, "but I came back when I'd seen Lady St. Craye home. I hope there's nothing wrong with Miss Desmond."

"Come in," said Vernon. "I'll tell you the whole thing."

They went into the room desolate with the disorder of half empty cups and scattered plates with crumbs of cake on them.

"Miss Desmond told me about her meeting you. Well, she gave you the slip; she went back and got that woman—Lottie what's her name—and took her to live with her."

"Good God! She didn't know, of course?"

"But she did know—that's the knock-down blow. She knew, and she wanted to save her."

Temple was silent a moment.

"I say, you know, though—that's rather fine," he said presently.

"Oh, yes," said Vernon impatiently, "it's very romantic and all that. Well, the woman stayed a fortnight and disappeared to-day. Miss Desmond is breaking her heart about her."

"So she took her up, and—she's rather young for rescue work."

"Rescue work? Bah! She talks of the woman as the only girl friend she's ever had. And the woman's probably gone off with her watch and chain and a collection of light valuables. Only I couldn't tell Miss Desmond that. So I promised to try and find the woman. She's a thorough bad lot. I've run up against her once or twice with chaps I know."

"She's not that sort," said Temple. "I know her fairly well."

"What—Sir Galahad? Oh, I won't ask inconvenient questions." Vernon's sneer was not pretty.

"She used to live with de Villermay," said Temple steadily; "he was the first—the usual coffee maker business, you know, though God knows how an English girl got into it. When he went home to be married—It was rather beastly. The father came up—offered her a present. She threw it at him. Then Schauermacher wanted her to live with him. No. She'd go to the devil her own way. And she's gone."

"Can't something be done?" said Vernon.

"I've tried all I know. You can save a woman who doesn't know where she's going. Not one who knows and means to go. Besides, she's been at it six months; she's past reclaiming now."

"I wonder," said Vernon—and his sneer had gone and he looked ten years younger—"............