"I refuse. This morning, when we had no way to turn, I was ready to stand by you. But now--now I wash my hands of it all. If you go--" Her face turned ashen. "If I go?" she repeated. "You go alone." "And afterward?" He dashed a distracted hand across his forehead and turned away without answer. "Yet I must go," she said. Before her blind fingers found the outer door, he was again beside her. "You're right," he owned. "Forgive me, Jean. We'll see it through." * * * * * Their ride in the twilight seemed an excursion in eternity. Home-going New York met them in obstructive millions. Apparently they alone sought the lower city. From zone to zone they descended--luxury, shabby gentility, squalor succeeding in turn--till their destination loomed a dread tangible reality. It was fittingly seated here, Jean felt, where life's dregs drifted uppermost, sin was a commonplace, arrest a diversion. Would not such as these glory in the deed she found so hard? Would not the brain beneath that "picture" hat, the sable plumes of which--jaunty, insolent, triumphant--floated the center of a sidewalk throng, envy her the publicity from which she shrank? Then, as the ribald crowd passed and the garish blaze of a concert-saloon lit the woman's face, she threw herself back in the shadow with a sharp cry. "Look, Craig! Look!" Atwood craned from the cab, which a dray had blocked, but saw only agitated backs as the saloon swallowed up the pavement idol. A policeman grinned sociably from the curb. "Stella Wilkes," he explained. "Chesty, ain't she? She was pretty wilted, though, when they ran her in. I saw her come." Craig's hand convulsively gripped Jean's. "They've let her go?" he questioned. "She's free?" "Sure--an' callin' on her friends. Hadn't you heard? Mrs. Chapman left a note ownin' up. If they'd found it sooner, this party would have had a pleasanter afternoon. Still, I guess she's plenty satisfied. They say a vaudeville house has offered her five hundred a week. She'd better cinch the deal to-night. It will all be forgotten to-morrow." Atwood strained the white-faced figure to his breast. "You heard him, Jean? He's right. It _will_ be forgotten to-morrow." From that dear shelter she, too, foresaw a kindlier future. [Illustration: From that dear shelter she, too, foresaw a kindlier future.] "To-morrow," she echoed.