Mrs Griffiths looked at her; Nesta looked full at Mrs Griffiths. "I must tell you something; I know you will hate me; I know you will, but if you would be kind just for once--" "Goodness me, child! Of course I'll be kind. What is troubling you? Anything wrong with the mother?" "It isn't that--it is that when I came with you I ran away." "You did what?" said Mrs Griffiths. Nesta mumbled out her miserable story. She told it dismally. Mrs Griffiths had, as she averred afterwards, to drag the words from the child. At last the ugly facts were made plain to her. Nesta had deliberately left her home without saying one word to anybody. She had been aided and abetted by Flossie, Mrs Griffiths' good, honourable, open-hearted Flossie--at least that is what Mrs Griffiths had considered her child. Yes, Flossie had helped her friend, and her friend had gone; she had not said a word to any one at home; she had only sent off a telegram. The telegram, of course, must bear the Scarborough mark, but they had taken no notice. "Of course, Mr Griffiths went to see them, and of course they told him, and of course--of course, he will be just mad," said Mrs Griffiths. "He will be in a towering rage; I don't know what he won't do. There'll be a split between us; he'll never let our Flossie speak to you again, that's plain." "Oh, Mrs Griffiths, if you would be good, if you would but just lend me enough money to get home before--before he comes." "Well, now, that wouldn't be a bad idea," said Mrs Griffiths. "You can make off, I will see you into the tram; you don't mind travelling third-class, do you?" "I'd travel on the top of the train--I'd travel in the guard's van--I'd travel anywhere only to get away," said Nesta. "Well, child, I'll just look up the trains, and put you into one myself--or no, perhaps I'd better not. You might give us the slip, as it were. If he thought that I'd let you go home before he came, he'd give me a piece of his mind, and there'd be the mischief to pay again. You can find your own way to the station." "I can. I can." "I'll look out the very next train, the very next." "Oh, do, please do. And please lend me some money." Mrs Griffiths produced half a sovereign, which she put into Nesta's palm. Nesta hardly waited to thank her. "Good-bye. Oh, I am grateful--I will write. Explain to Flossie. Try to forgive me--it was so dull at home, only Miss Mule Selfish, you know, and Molly and Ethel." "And your mother," said Mrs Griffiths, a little severely, for it was the thought of the anxiety that Nesta had given her mother which touched Mrs Griffiths' heart most nearly. "Mothery wouldn't be cross, that is certain sure," said poor Nesta. She was putting on her hat as she uttered the words, and a few minutes later she was toiling through the hot sun and blinding dust, for the day was a windy one, to the railway station _en route_ for Newcastle. CHAPTER TWENTY FIVE. NEMESIS.