"In spite of her name!" Mamie smiled. "Oh your 'names'--! In spite of everything." "Ah I'm something of an artist." With which, and a relapse marked by her wistful eyes into the gravity of the matter, she supremely fixed her friend. She felt how little she minded betraying at last the extremity of her need, and it was out of this extremity that her appeal proceeded. "Have I really had your last word? It means so much to me." Lady Wantridge came straight to the point. "You mean you depend on it?" "Awfully!" "Is it all you have?" "All. Now." "But Mrs. Short Stokes and the others--'rolling,' aren't they? Don't they pay up?" "Ah," sighed Mamie, "if it wasn't for THEM--!" Lady Wantridge perceived. "You've had so much?" "I couldn't have gone on." "Then what do you do with it all?" "Oh most of it goes back to them. There are all sorts, and it's all help. Some of them have nothing." "Oh if you feed the hungry," Lady Wantridge laughed, "you're indeed in a great way of business. Is Mrs. Medwin"--her transition was immediate--"really rich?" "Really. He left her everything." "So that if I do say 'yes'--" "It will quite set me up." "I see--and how much more responsible it makes one! But I'd rather myself give you the money." "Oh!" Mamie coldly murmured. "You mean I mayn't suspect your prices? Well, I daresay I don't! But I'd rather give you ten pounds." "Oh!" Mamie repeated in a tone that sufficiently covered her prices. The question was in every way larger. "Do you never forgive?" she reproachfully inquired. The door opened however at the moment she spoke and Scott Homer presented himself. CHAPTER IV Scott Homer wore exactly, to his sister's eyes, the aspect he had worn the day before, and it also formed to her sense the great feature of his impartial greeting. "How d'ye do, Mamie? How d'ye do, Lady Wantridge?" "How d'ye do again?" Lady Wantridge replied with an equanimity striking to her hostess. It was as if Scott's own had been contagious; it was almost indeed as if she had seen him before. Had she ever so seen him--before the previous day? While Miss Cutter put to herself this question her visitor at all events met the one she had previously uttered. "Ever 'forgive'?" this personage echoed in a tone that made as little account as possible of the interruption. "Dear yes! The people I HAVE forgiven!" She laughed--perhaps a little nervously; and she was now looking at Scott. The way she looked at him was precisely what had already had its effect for his sister. "The people I can!" "Can you forgive me?" asked Scott Homer. She took it so easily. "But--what?"