"You can’t wait till the autumn?" "No." "Then what’ll you do?" "I’m not thinking of myself just now. It doesn’t matter," said Alexandra wearily. "I know. You’re bothering your poor head about Miss Delamere. Don’t you fret. She’s got some one to look after her. That’s better than looking after yourself. I daresay she’s sleeping in a creep de sheeny nightdress to-night with real lace on her pillows." "Don’t talk like that!" Alexandra shuddered. "Well, it’s no good trying to walk clean on a muddy road. Drink your cocoa while it’s hot, dearie. If you’re on the stage you must go on like the angels in heaven, doing what Rome does, where there’s very little marriage or giving in marriage." Mrs. Bell’s metaphor was mixed, but her views were definite. "That’s why I would rather see my own girl lying here at my feet dead and smiling in her coffin than in the profession. She’s a respectable upper housemaid," she finished comfortably, as she closed the door behind her. Alexandra tried to eat a little dry bread. The butter was rancid. She ended by giving up the attempt. Her throat ached. She leant her head on the table. It ached as much as her heart and throat did. Her whole body was permeated with the pain of unshed tears. Maggy had gone. Except for the letter, which was final enough, it was difficult to realize. She had not even taken her box, only a small handbag. Her possessions had been so pitifully meager. Her wooden-backed brush and a metal comb were still on the dressing-table, but the cheap German silver powder box and her rouge and cream pots were gone; there was the nightdress case on her bed in the crochet work that was Maggy’s hobby with the big badly-worked M in washed-out greens and pinks. Wrapped in a little screw of paper was the money she had left behind. She had taken Alexandra’s photograph, and for some reason she had turned the face of her own to the wall. A wild desire came to Alexandra to run out, late as it was, go to Maggy and bring her back. Then she remembered that she did not even know where Maggy was. She was gone and that was all; swallowed up in the immensity of London; captured by some man unknown. The realization that Maggy had deliberately stolen away at the call of exigency hurt her acutely. Passion had never touched Alexandra. Just now she could only feel impatience with one who was moved by it to extremes. But mingled with the distaste for a thing she could not comprehend was compassion for her friend. Some part of Maggy must be suffering, sorry. No woman surrenders herself without some secret, sacred regret. She sat thinking, trying not to think, for hours. Finally, she undressed and, in the darkness, said her prayers. She felt they were futile, childish.... She turned her face to the wall so that she should not see the ghostly outline of Maggy’s narrow, empty bed.