"Did you?" Helen returned in another tone and with an innocence that surprised herself and revealed the deceit latent in the mouth of the most truthful. It was long since she had been so near a lie and lying was ugly: it made smudges on the world; but disloyalty was no better, and though she could not have explained the debt, she felt that she owed George silence. She had to choose. He had been like a child as he fumbled over his apologies and she could not but be tender with a child. Yet only a few seconds earlier she had thought he was the tinker. Oh, why had Rupert ever told her of the tinker? "I would rather you did not wander on the moor so late at night," Mildred Caniper said. "But it's the best time of all." "I would rather you did not." "Very well. I'll try to remember." A sign from Miriam drew Helen into the garden. "Silly of you to come in by the front way. Of course she heard. If the garden door is locked, you can climb the wall and get on to the scullery roof. Then there's my window." Helen measured the distance with her eye. "It's too high up." "Throw up a shoe and I'll lower a chair for you." "But--this is horrid," Helen said. "Why should I?" Miriam's thin shoulders went up and down. "You never know, you never know," she chanted. "You never know what you may come to." "Don't!" Helen begged. She leaned against a poplar and looked mournfully from the window to Miriam's face. "No," Miriam said, "I've never done it. I only planned it in case of need. It would be a way of escape, too, if she ever locked me up. She's capable of that. Helen, I don't like this rejuvenation!" "Don't," Helen said again. "I haven't mended the sheets she gave me weeks ago." "I'll help you with them." "Good, kind, Christian girl! There's nothing like having a reputation to keep up. That's why I told you about my secret road." "You're--vulgar." "No, I'm human, and very young, and rather beautiful. And quite intelligent." There came on her face the look which made her seem old and tired with her own knowledge. "Was it Zebedee last night?" Heat ran over Helen's body like a living thing. "You're hateful," she stammered. "As though Zebedee and I--as though Zebedee and I would meet by stealth!" "Honestly, I can't see why you shouldn't. Why shouldn't you?" Helen smoothed her forehead with both hands. "It was the way you said it," she murmured painfully and then straightened herself. "Of course nothing Zebedee would do could be anything but good. I beg his pardon." And in a failing voice, she explained again, "It was the way you said it." "I suppose I'm not really a nice person," Miriam replied. CHAPTER XVIII