He himself saw and interviewed ‘Suppliant’ during the temporary, and unfortunate, absence of Miss Halifax, who, by his desire, had undertaken the case. He entrusted many such to her now, especially where feminine appeals were concerned. It seems slanderous to apply so shrewd a term to those soft and seductive orbs, but indeed the amanuensis had a ‘lynx eye’ for the shams and hypocrisies of her own sex. Without doubt her native perspicacity had saved her employer from the clutches of many a plausible impostor miscalled of the weaker vessel. ‘Suppliant’--she introduced herself hurriedly, diffidently by the name--entered upon Gilead in one of the unguarded moments. He was impressed by her appearance at once; it was all that it should have been under the circumstances--quiet and unaffected, though with a suggestion of strong repressed emotion in the thickly-veiled face. She seemed a young woman, she was certainly a graceful and slender, as her sober frock betrayed. It was of black, and just sufficiently faded to confess long usage. There was a heavy trimming of beads at the skirt hem, which weighed down its folds prettily about the tips of a couple of little shoes, worn but shapely. The long motor veil which embraced her hat and neck was of a heliotrope colour, not so diaphanous as to reveal, yet enough to suggest the entreaty of two large plaintive eyes. But the attractive, the moving thing about her was her voice--so soft, so musical, that, before she had half uttered her prayer, it was granted. Gilead, as he placed a chair for the visitor, apologized in his courteous way. “I am so sorry. The lady, Miss Halifax, who has made your case her interest, is unhappily engaged elsewhere for the moment. If you would prefer to await her return--” The visitor made a little distressed movement. “I did not know,” she said, hesitating--there was that low huskiness in her voice which seems to caress--“I did not know. Since receiving your letter--I heard, I have been told--are you not Mr Balm?” “Yes, I am Mr Balm.” “O, I don’t know what to do!” she whispered. “It is so urgent, and they say about you--” “Nothing unflattering, I trust,” said Gilead smiling, seeing that she paused for an expression. “O, no, no!” answered the visitor. “But only that one appealing to you--to you above all--may expect--” Again she stopped. “Reason, I hope,” said Gilead gently. “I try to practise it. Sympathy and help, unless given in reason, are likely to defeat their own objects, are they not?” “Yes,” said the visitor forlornly; and she seemed to droop a little. “Does that discourage you?” asked the young man. She raised her head. “Is it in reason,” she said, “to expect one, however merciful, however pitiful, to save another from the just consequences of his own misdeeds?” “That depends,” said Gilead, “whether or not mercy to the sinner entails a wrong to the sinned against.” She sighed, and whispered: “I do not know--I do not know. If you will only tell me?”