Noel promised with a willingness that seemed to comfort her. Absorbed in the child once more, she soon seemed to forget him and silence fell between them again. It was scarcely broken during the whole return trip. She seemed to have nothing to say to him. When she spoke to him at all her thrilling voice dropped to a whisper, and it was always to give some information about the baby. Once she said with fervent interest, "He is asleep," and once she told him that his skin felt cool and natural. This was all. It must be owned that Noel didn't think very lovingly of that poor atom of humanity as he sat there. It was the baby that had caused her to be in this false position, which he felt so keenly, and it was terror for the baby which brought that suffering look to her face. And yet something of the same feeling was in his own breast as he palpitated at the thought of this little creature's dying and breaking the heart of its mother, who plainly loved it with the absorbingness of the first passion she had ever known. When they reached the wharf it was quite dark, and the electric lights and publicity of the place made Noel shrink so from the thought of exposing the girl, in her suffering, to the gaze of such men and women as he saw about him, that, without consulting her, he called a carriage and helped her into it, following and seating himself opposite her. She protested at first, but he said: "I have a long way to go and need a carriage, and I may as well drop you at home. Where must I put you down?" She gave a street and number. The door was shut, the man mounted to his box and drove away, and they were alone together. Alone, except for the baby, but that was enough to make him feel that he and all the world beside were thousands of miles away from her. They drove on in silence. Now and then as they passed a bright light, her beautiful face, outlined by its dark hat-brim and darker hair, shone out from the shadow, but for which he might have felt himself in a dream interrupted by no sound, except the monotonous rumble of the wheels. Always as he looked her eyes were lowered to catch each passing glimpse of the baby's face. She never looked at him. He began to feel it necessary to ask one or two questions that he might know what to prepare for, but as he broke the silence to begin she said warningly, in a low whisper: "Sh-sh-sh, he is waking," and then fell to rocking and crooning over the baby and coaxing him back to sleep. When he seemed quite quiet again she said suddenly in a low whisper, and in the dark he felt her eyes upon him: "What makes you so kind? No one is ever kind to me. I thought nobody cared. I had one friend but she went away. She did not want to leave me, but she had to go far off somewhere to make a living for her mother." "I will always help you if you will let me," Noel said, whispering too, for fear of being silenced. "I will send my sisters to see you, if you will let them come--"