"Lord, Suzanne, you don’t want to take it this way," he soothed, guiding her to the sofa. "You must get hold of yourself; you’ve been brooding too much. Of course I’ll help you—anything I can do—and we’ll get her back, it’ll be only a few days." He didn’t know what to say, he was so sorry for her. She was past parleys and preliminaries, past coquetry and artifice. The whole of her had resolved itself into one raw longing, and before they were seated on the sofa, she had broken into her story. He didn’t at first believe her, thought grief had unsettled her brain, but when she thrust the two letters into his hand all doubts left him. He read them slowly, word by word, then turned upon her a face so charged and vitalized with a fierce interest that, had she been able to see beyond the circle of her own pain, she would have wondered. If he forgot to ask for Esther’s hiding place it was because the larger matter of her vindication had swept all else from his mind. The proofs of her innocence were in his hands; he did not for a moment doubt their genuineness. It was what he had thought from the first. His manner changed from that of the sympathizing friend to one of stern authority. He shot questions at her, tabulating her answers, discarding cumbering detail, seizing on the important fact and separating it from the jumble of confused impressions and fancies that she poured out. A few inquiries set Larkin’s position clear before him. The money he dismissed with a curt sentence; of course he would give it, she wasn’t to think of that any more. "Thank heaven you decided on me," he said. "I’ll straighten this out for you and I’ll do it quick." She was ready to take fright at anything and his eagerness scared her. "But you’ll not do anything they don’t want? You’ll not tell the police or try to catch them?" He had seen from the start that she was dominated by terror, as the kidnapers had intended she should be: and seeing this had recognized her as a negligible factor. To keep her quiet, soothe her fears, and employ her services just so far as they were helpful was what he had to do with her. What he had to do without her was shaping itself in his mind. "You can rely on me. I won’t make any breaks. And _you_ have to be careful, not a word about me to this man Larkin. He must think the money is yours." She assured him of her discretion and he felt he could trust her that far.