"Not absolutely," said Mabel. "The previous knowledge that one has of you would go for something. There was never any sign of an attachment of that kind between you and Effie. If you had been the father of the child you would most certainly not have left her alone, without any provision, at the time the child was born. I should be quite certain of that. So would the two maids here. Effie would apply to young Dobson, and failing him, to old Dobson. This is about the last house to which she would come. Her instinct would be to keep away from the neighborhood where she was known. If her own father agreed to take her in, it's almost certain that he would take the baby as well. Your ideas about that convention are exaggerated, and old-fashioned. If she did come here, and you insisted on her staying, I should put up with it, though I should not like it, until some arrangement could be made for her to go elsewhere with her child. And that arrangement could be made easily and quickly. I do not see why I should dismiss the maids, and if I did they are paid with your money, and are much more devoted to you than they are to me. You would only have to speak and they would remain. No seducer would bring his victim and her child to the house where his wife was living. You would be thought quixotic but not guilty. If Effie saw that you were cut by everybody and that she had brought trouble on you, she would be particularly careful not to cause more serious trouble for you by committing suicide. And if she committed suicide, she would not implicate you in it by making you buy the poison. She would neither make fruit tart, nor clean a straw hat, because she simply would not have the time. You don't know much about young babies, do you? I should not divorce you, and should have no evidence on which I could get a divorce. In fact, the whole thing's skittles. By the way, when did Effie have her baby?" "She never did," said Luke despondently. "That's always the way. Whenever I make a beautiful thing, some cow always gets it. It's happened before. If I wrote my beautiful biography, some cow would parody it. The world's full of cows." "Well, I'm sorry, of course," said Mabel. "You can do most incredibly foolish things. You do frequently fail to say what you should say. But even with those advantages, I doubt if it would be possible for you to incur so much suffering and suspicion as you describe. I shall have to think out some other little martyrdom for you." CHAPTER IX 1 Looking out of his window at the office in the afternoon, Luke Sharper saw a motor-car stop in front of the draper's opposite. Lady Tyburn got out and entered the shop. So she was back. Putting on his hat, so far as his agitated ears would permit, Luke rushed out into the street, crossed the road, and met her as she came out. "Jona," he panted. "Lukie, at last," she gasped. "You were not long in the shop!"