Thatcher glanced from him to Sheila. "Goodnight to you, ma'am," he said with gentleness. "Next time I'll bring the boy." "Please, please do." Sheila put her hand in his. He looked down at it as though something had startled him. In fact, her touch was like a flake of snow. When Thatcher had gone, Sylvester leaned closer to her across the bar. He moved his glass around in his hand and looked up at her humbly. "The tables kind of turned, eh?" he said. "What do you mean, Mr. Hudson?" Sheila, by lifting her voice, tried to dissipate the atmosphere of confidence, of secrecy. Carthy had moved away from them, the other occupants of the saloon were very apparently not listening. "Well, ma'am," Sylvester explained, "six months ago I was kind of layin' claim to gratitude from you, and now it's the other way round." "Yes," she said. "But I am still grateful." The words came, however, with a certain unwillingness, a certain lack of spontaneity. "Are you, though?" He put his head on one side so that Sheila was reminded of Dickie. For the first time a sort of shadowy resemblance between father and son was apparent to her. "Well, you've wiped the reckonin' off the slate by what you've done for me. You've given me my Aura. Say, you have been my fairy godmother, all right. Talk about wishes comin' true!" Again he looked about the room, and that wistfulness of the visionary stole into his face. His eyes came back to her with an expression that was almost beautiful. "If only that Englishman was here," he sighed. "Yes ma'am. I'm sure celebratin' to-night!" It was soon very apparent that he was celebrating. For an hour he stood every newcomer to a drink, and then he withdrew to a table in a shadowy corner, and sitting there, tilted against the wall, he sipped from his glass, smoked and dreamed. Hour after hour of the slow, noisy night went by and still he sat there, watching Sheila through the smoke, seeing in her, more and more glowingly, the body of his dream. It was after dawn when Sheila touched Carthy's elbow. The big Irishman looked down at her small, drawn face. "Mr. Carthy," she whispered, "would it be all right if I went home now? It's earlier than usual, but I'm so--awfully tired?" There was so urgent an air of secrecy in her manner that Carthy muttered his permission out of the corner of his mouth. Sheila melted from his side. The alley that had been silvery cool with dusk was now even more silvery cool with morning twilight. Small sunrise clouds were winging over it like golden doves. Sheila did not look at them. She ran breathless to her door, opened it, and found herself face to face with Dickie. CHAPTER XIV THE LIGHT OF DAWN