"H'm--and--has Mr. Lathrop had anything to do with the sale?" "Yes!" She looked up frankly, still smiling. "He has managed it for me." "And it never occurred to you to apply to your guardian in such a matter? Or to your lawyer?" She laughed--with what he admitted was a very natural scorn. "Ask my guardian to provide me with the means of helping the 'Daughters'--when he regards us all as criminals? On the contrary, I wanted to relieve your conscience, Mr. Winnington!" "I can't say you have succeeded," he said, grimly, as he began to pace the drawing-room, with slow steps, his hands in his pockets. "Why not? Now--everything you give me--can go to the right things--what you consider the right things. And what is my own--my very own--I can use as I please." Yet neither tone nor gesture were defiant, as they would have been a few weeks before. Rather her look was wistful--appealing--as she stood there, a perplexing, but most charming figure, in her plain black dress, with its Quakerish collar of white lawn. He turned on her impetuously. "And Mr. Lathrop has arranged it all for you?" "Yes. He said he knew a good deal about jewellers. I gave him some diamonds. He took them to London, and he has sold them." "How do you know he has even treated you honestly!" "I am certain he has done it honestly!" she cried indignantly. "There are the letters--from the jewellers--" And running to the bureau, she took thence a packet of letters and thrust them into Winnington's hands. He looked them through in silence,--turning to her, as he put them down. "I see. It is of course possible that this firm of jewellers have paid Mr. Lathrop a heavy commission behind the scenes, of which you know nothing. But I don't press that. Indeed I will assume exactly the contrary. I will suppose that Mr. Lathrop has acted without any profit to himself. If so, in my eyes it only makes the matter worse--for it establishes a claim on you. Miss Delia!--" his resolute gaze held her--"I do not take a farthing of this money unless you allow me to write to Mr. Lathrop, and offer him a reasonable commission for his services!" "No--no! Impossible!" She turned away from him, towards the window, biting her lip--in sharp distress. "Then I return you this cheque"--he laid it down beside her. "And I shall replace the money,--the L500--which I ought never to have allowed you to spend as you have done, out of my own private pocket." She stood silent, looking into the garden, her chest heaving. She thought of what Lady Tonbridge had told her of his modest means--and those generous hidden uses of them, of which even his most intimate friends only got an occasional glimpse. Suddenly she went up to him-- "Will you--will you promise me to write civilly?" she said, in a wavering voice. "Certainly." "You won't offend--insult him?"