“Now,” said she, with a weary air of being glad to get rid of a burden, “you know everything. You can see why it was impossible for me to tell you anything. I was under promise--oath--not to let any creature on earth know what I was and what my work was. I was fully sheltered by the fact that it was my uncle who had started me on this most distasteful but most remunerative career, and though I have often asked him to release me, he has always refused until I could assist in carrying out some sensational feat, to justify, as he said, his choice of me for this career.” “And he has released you now?” “Of course. If he had not, you would have known nothing, you would have been told nothing.” “You might have trusted me,” said Gerard reproachfully. She turned upon him quickly. “I could trust no one,” she said. “A word, nay, a look, while I was living under the same roof with a gang of dangerous criminals, might have been death to me. I knew that, while I was staying with them, I carried my life in my hand. It was by far the worst experience I have ever had, and I could not have gone through with it, could not have stood the strain of being always on the watch for the proofs which I had to hoard up to communicate to the police, but for my uncle’s promise that it should be the last, the very last thing he would call upon me to do.” Gerard involuntarily heaved a deep sigh of thankfulness. “And you have done with it?” he said. “Yes.” His tone grew harder. “For the time, that is, of course. You will probably find your way back when you are asked by the friends you have formed. It was Cecil Jones who accompanied you everywhere, wasn’t it? When you detected pickpockets in a crowd, and handed him the stolen property? When you accompanied him to the police-station to give evidence against the shop-lifter at the stores--” “You thought _I_ was the shop-lifter!” said Miss Davison demurely. “Well, I know better now. As I say, you always had this Jones--” “Whose name is not Jones at all.” “Well, you had this fellow who calls himself Jones to help you and to stand by you.” “Yes. My uncle, who gives advice to the police in important cases still, though he has practically retired, picked out this man as one he could rely upon to help me.” “And now I suppose you will marry him?” said Gerard fiercely. Miss Davison looked demurely down on the pavement. “He has a wife,” she said, “and three, if not four, children.” “Thank God!” Miss Davison suddenly stopped and held out her hand. “Good-night,” said she, “Mr. Buckland, and--good-bye.” He took her hand and held it in his own, which was trembling. “Must it be good-bye, Rachel?” he said hoarsely. “Surely,” said she, with a little forced, weary laugh, “you don’t want to remain a friend of an ex-detective!”