“I cannot say, mother,” replied Hector indifferently, in the act himself of leaving the room also, determined on yet another attempt to speak to Annie. In the meantime, however, Annie had found her opportunity. She had met Mr. Macintosh halfway down the last flight of stairs, and had lifted to him such a face of entreaty that he listened at once to her prayer for a private interview, and, turning, led the way up again to the room he had just left. There he shut the door, and said to her pleasantly: “Well, Annie, what is it?” I am afraid his man-imagination had led him to anticipate some complaint against Hector: he certainly was nowise prepared for what the poor self-accusing girl had to say. For one moment she stood unable to begin; the next she had recovered her resolution: her face filled with a sudden glow; and ere her master had time to feel shocked, she was on her knees at his feet, holding up to him a new pound-note, one of those her mistress had just given her. Familiar, however, as her master was with the mean-looking things in which lay almost all his dealings, he did not at first recognize the object she offered him; while what connection with his wife’s parlor-maid it could represent was naturally inconceivable to him. He stood for a moment staring at the note, and then dropped a pair of dull, questioning eyes on the face of the kneeling girl. He was not a man of quick apprehension, and the situation was appallingly void of helpful suggestion. To make things yet more perplexing, Annie sobbed as if her heart would break, and was unable to utter a word. “What must a stranger imagine,” the poor man thought, “to come upon such a tableau?” Her irrepressible emotion lasted so long that he lost his patience and turned upon her, saying: “I must call your mistress; she will know what to do with you!” Instantly she sprang to her feet, and broke into passionate entreaty. “Oh, please, _please_, sir, have a minute’s patience with me,” she cried; “you never saw me behave so badly before!” “Certainly not, Annie; I never did. And I hope you will never do so again,” answered her master, with reviving good-nature, and was back in his first notion, that Hector had said something to her which she thought rude and did not like to repeat. He had never had a daughter, and perhaps all the more felt pitiful over the troubled woman-child at his feet.