It was the loving distress on Enid Barr’s quivering face that quickly brought Sally to bewildered, humiliated submission, rather than the cold anger and ill-concealed hatred in Courtney Barr’s pale gray eyes. Enid had left the arm of her husband’s chair and had drawn Sally to a little rose-up-holstered settee, and it was with her mother’s hand cuddling hers compassionately that Sally listened as the man’s heavy, judicial voice went on and on: “I am sure, Sally, that when you have had time for reflection you will see my viewpoint. Naturally, your mother’s happiness means more to me than does yours, and I believe I know my wife well enough to state positively that a newspaper scandal or even gossip among our own circle would cause her the most acute distress. It shall be our task, Sally, to see that she is spared such distress. “I’m sorry to appear brutal,” Barr said stiffly. “But it is better for us to face the facts, for if our friends ever know them they will not mince words. If you should come into our home now, as you are, gossips would immediately set themselves to dig up the facts. Too many people already know that Sally Ford has been sought by the police as a—delinquent. My wife and I could not possibly hope to explain our extraordinary interest in a runaway orphan. Do you agree with me, Sally?” He tried to make his voice kind, but his eyes were as cold and hard as steel. “Yes, sir,” Sally agreed in her meek, institutional voice. But she felt so sick with shame and anger that her only desire then was to run and run and run until she found a haven in David’s arms. At the thought, some of the spiritedness which her few weeks of independence had fostered in her asserted itself. “But, Mr. Barr, if I would disgrace my mother, why don’t you let me go? I can marry David and no one will ever know that I have a mother—” “That is very sensible, Sally,” Courtney Barr nodded, a gleam of kindliness in his cold eyes, “and I have tried to make your mother believe that your happiness would be best assured by your sticking to your own class—” “It isn’t her class, if you mean that she’s suited only to poverty and hard work!” Enid Barr interrupted passionately. “Look at her, Court! She’s a born lady! She’s fine and delicate clear through—” “And so is David!” Sally cried indignantly. “He may be middle-class, but he’s the finest, most honorable man in the world!”