"Oh, Alice, let us drop so disagreeable a subject," said her mother. "Come, Richard and I want some music." "Any way," said Alice, rising, "I do very much hope you will bring the subject up in your visit to the directors. It has grown on me under the talks of the old Bishop and what I have seen myself--it has become a nightmare to me." "I don't think it is any of our business at all," spoke up Mrs. Westmore quickly. Alice turned her big, earnest eyes and beautiful face on her mother. "Do you remember when I was six years old?" she asked. "Of course I do." "Suppose--suppose--that our poverty had come to us then, and you and papa had died and left brother and me alone and friendless. Then suppose we had been put into that mill to work fourteen hours a day--we--your own little ones--brother and I"-- Mrs. Westmore sprang up with a little shriek and put her hands over her daughter's mouth. Richard Travis shrugged his shoulders: "I had not thought of it that way myself," he said. "That goes home to one." Richard Travis was always uplifted in the presence of Alice. It was wonderful to him what a difference in his feelings, his behavior, his ideas, her simple presence exerted. As he looked at her he thought of last night's debauch--the bar-room--the baseness and vileness of it all. He thought of his many amours. He saw the purity and grandeur of her in this contrast--all her queenliness and beauty and simplicity. He even thought of Maggie and said to himself: "Suppose Alice should know all this.... My God! I would have no more chance of winning her than of plucking a star from the sky!" He thought of Helen and it made him serious. Helen's was a different problem from Maggie's. Maggie was a mill girl--poor, with a bed-ridden father. She was nameless. But Helen--she was of the same blood and caste of this beautiful woman before him, whom he fully expected to make his wife. There was danger in Helen--he must act boldly, but decisively--he must take her away with him--out of the State, the South even. Distance would be his protection, and her pride and shame would prevent her ever letting her whereabouts or her fate be known. Cold-bloodedly, boldly, and with clear-cut reasoning, all this ran through his mind as he stood looking at Alice Westmore. We are strangely made--the best of us. Men have looked on the Madonna and wondered why the artist had not put more humanity there--had not given her a sensual lip, perhaps. And on the Cross, the Christ was thinking of a thief. Two hours later he was bidding her good-bye. "Next Sunday, do you remember--Alice--next Sunday night you are to tell me--to fix the day, Sweet?" "Did mother tell you that?" she asked. "She should let me speak for myself." But somehow he felt that she would. Indeed he knew it as he kissed her hand and bade her good-night.