For a moment he stopped, as if to speak; but he remembered the next instant that he had no right to question her, and he stood gazing sternly at her, while, as she shrank back into a corner of the landing, her look was keen and defiant--the look of the hunted at bay. Once he had followed her for some distance, and then perhaps he would have spoken; but now the desire seemed gone, and linked together in his mind were Lucy, _ma mere_, the ruffian he had left up-stairs, and this woman. "But what is it to me?" he thought bitterly; and, hurrying down the stairs, he stood for a moment at the doorway, heedless of the children scampering over the broken pavement--heedless that, with hot eyes and fevered cheeks, Lucy had left her sewing-machine and stepped back from the window that she should neither see nor be seen--heedless of all around; for his thoughts were a strange medley--pride, duty, and passion seeking to lead him by different roads. Then for a while he remembered the poor woman he had left, whose leave-taking he felt was near--a parting that he could not but feel would be a happy release from sorrow and suffering. At last, turning to go, he cast his eyes towards the open window that Lucy had so lately left, when, with knitted brow and care gnawing at his heart, he passed out into the street, and walked towards his lodgings; but even there, in the midst of the busy throng, where the deafening hum of the traffic of the great city was ever rising and falling, now swelling into a roar, and again sinking to the hurried buzz of the busy workers, ever rang in his ears the bitter words of the old Frenchwoman--"Our beauty, some of us!" Volume Two, Chapter VIII. DOCUMENTARY EVIDENCE. "Now, sir," said old Matt, as he appeared, brushed-up and smart for the occasion, punctual to his appointment; "now, sir; here we are--baptism, marriage, and doctor. First ought to come last, you know, only Saint Mark's Church comes before Finsbury, don't you see?" Septimus Hardon rose from his writing with a sigh, for he was far from sanguine of success, and would fain even now have given up his task entirely, so feeble seemed to him the likelihood of any advantage accruing; but in obedience to instructions from Mrs Septimus, old Matt rattled on about the future, thoroughly doing his duty in keeping the shrinking man to his part; and so they started. They made their way out into Holborn, and then up Skinner-street, past the frowning walls of Newgate, and into the street of the same name; when old Matt could not get along for stopping to admire the various joints displayed, and giving his opinion upon their merits.