"I think it would be best to remove them to a more strictly English influence." This hurt her horribly. She grew impatient for the finishing blow. "And now that they are disposed of, have you decided what's to become of me?" "It is not for me to decide. By the by, have you any one to represent you or intercede for you here, or act as your counsel in England?" She shook her head. "A good many people have been very nice to me, of course. I've noticed, though, that even they grew cold and distant of late. I'd rather die than ask any of them." "But have you no relatives living--no one of importance in the States who could vouch for you?" She shook her head with a doleful humility. "None of our family were ever important that I ever heard of, though of course one never knows what relatives are lurking about. Mine will never claim me; that's certain. I did have a sister--poor thing!--if she's alive. We didn't get along very well. I was too wild and restless as a girl. She was very good, hard-working, simple, homely as sin--or homely as virtue. I was all for adventure. I've had my fill of it. But once you begin it, you can't stop when you've had enough. If she's not dead, she's probably married and living under another name--Heaven knows what name or where. But I could find her, perhaps. I'd love to go to her. She was a very good girl. She's probably married a good man and has brought up her children piously, and never mentioned me. I'd only bring disgrace on her. She'd disown me if I came home with this cloud of scandal about me." "No one shall know of this scandal unless you tell." She laughed harshly, with a patronizing superiority. "Really, Mr. Verrinder, did you ever know a secret to be kept?" "This one will be." She laughed again at him, then at herself. He rose wearily. "I think I shall have to be getting along. I haven't had a bath or a shave to-day. I shall ask you to keep to your room and deny yourself to all visitors. I won't ask you to promise not to escape. If the guard around the house is not capable of detaining you, you're welcome to your freedom, though I warn you that England is as hard to get out of as to get into nowadays. Whatever you do, for your own sake, at least, keep this whole matter secret and stick to the story we agreed on. Good morning!" He bowed himself out. No rattling of chains marked his closing of the door, but if he had been a turnkey in Newgate he could not have left Marie Louise feeling more a prisoner. Her room was her body's jail, but her soul was in a dungeon, too. As Verrinder went down the hall he scattered a covey of whispering servants.