"I am very foolish," she answered, in a low, unsteady voice. "It isn't my ankle--though, of course, that hurts a little--but I think It must be the shock, which I didn't realise at first. I felt quite bright until a moment ago, but suddenly I am all weak and trembling. The truth is, Mr. Stanton, I wasn't fit to be out this morning, especially alone, and I didn't come simply from sheer bravado, as you might think, and for the sake of doing what I'd been told not to do. I--I felt as though I _must_ be out in the air, and in motion. I didn't sleep last night, and I didn't eat any breakfast this morning, which may partly account for this silliness of mine, perhaps. I thought I should feel better out of doors, but it seems that nothing in the world can do me any good. Everything I attempt must always end in disaster, and--oh, Mr. Stanton, I am so very, very unhappy and miserable!" To my amazement and distress, she covered her face with her little gloved hands, and broke into a storm of sobbing. CHAPTER VII Friends It was all I could do to resist the impulse to take the small trembling hands in my own, to touch the bowed head with its glory of shimmering ripples, to break into passionate words which must have alarmed her, and put an end to my chance of winning her, perhaps for ever. But to a certain extent I was able to control myself. "What can I say--what can I do?" I stammered. "If there was only some way in which it might be possible for me to help you." "Ah, if--if!" she echoed, desolately. "Don't you think it strange that, though we scarcely know each other--though this is only our second meeting, and quite by chance, I turn to you with such a confession? I am ashamed now"--and she impetuously dashed her tears away with a toy of a handkerchief. "But the words spoke themselves before I could stop them. You see, I have no one to talk to--no one to advise me. I think I must be the loneliest girl in all this big preoccupied world." "I should have thought you would have more friends than you could keep within bounds," I said, hotly. "Friends? Has anyone many friends? I have plenty of acquaintances, but I think no friends. Let us not talk of this any more, though, Mr. Stanton. I have forgotten myself." "Forgive me--I can't obey you," I protested. "Just one word. As you said, this is only our second meeting, and I have no right to ask a favour of you, yet I am going to do it. I beg of you, as I never begged anything before, that you will forget how short a time we have known each other, and that you will take me for a friend--a friend in the truest and best sense of that good, much-abused word. I swear to you that you would find me loyal." She looked up at me in the sweetest way, with eyes that glistened through a sheen of tears.