"The twins don't want me.... They're quite happy. They don't want me any more. Where can I go?" Mr. Shawyer did not answer. Against his better judgment he was conscious of a most unwilling pity for this girl. He knew the whole story now, had heard it that morning from Forrester's lips, so perhaps it was not altogether without intention that presently he said quietly: "My dear child, there is ... Mr. Digby!" Faith flushed scarlet from her throat to her hair. Such an expression of revolt and fear crossed her face that for a moment she no longer looked a child, but a woman who has lived a lifetime of bitter experience. "If you knew--how I ... hate him," she said, and quite suddenly she broke down, hiding her face in her hands, her slender body shaken with passionate sobbing. Mr. Shawyer rose. He made her sit down, and stood beside her, keeping a hand on her shoulder. "My dear," he said, "I am an old man, and you are only a child! Is it too late for me to try and put things right between you and your husband?" Faith shook her head. "He hates me ... he'll never forgive me ... last night ... oh, I shall never forget his eyes!" Mr. Shawyer walked a step or two away from her, then came back resolutely. "Perhaps I shall be doing no good by my interference," he said gently. "But at least I can do no harm, when I tell you that my belief is that your husband has never ceased to care for you! No, no--he has said nothing to me----" he hastened to add, as Faith raised a face flushed with eager hope. "But I pride myself that I know him very well, and therefore I believe that he still has a great regard for you. When he came to me this morning he was utterly broken down--he had lost everything at one blow--his wife, his friend, and that brave girl Peg." "Peg!" said Faith with a little shiver. "The best friend either of you ever had," Mr. Shawyer insisted gently. "The most loyal friend!" "Oh, I know, I know!" said Faith weeping; she could not bear to remember in what manner she and Peg had parted. Mr. Shawyer went on steadily. "Think what a shock her death has been to your husband, without his friend's treachery, and...." he stopped, feeling her shrink beneath his hand, and for a moment there was silence before he went on sadly: "I have always looked upon Nicholas as a hard man of the world, perhaps incapable of deep feeling, but this morning he was just a broken-hearted boy when he came to tell me what had happened, and that is why I dare to ask you if you will not go to him, and beg for his forgiveness." "Oh--I couldn't...." He took his hand from her shoulder. "Then I am afraid he will go away, and that you will never see him again." Faith checked her sobbing. She sat with her hands clasped in her lap, staring before her with haggard eyes. With every passing moment now it came home to her afresh how much she had lost, how much she had thrown away in her wilfulness and blindness.