"Ah, I see. You wish to—to inspect her," I blundered on stupidly, whereat she laughed. "No—not exactly," she smiled. "To tell the truth, Mr. Byrd, I wish to inspect you—" "Well, this is all there is of me," I broke in. "And I want," she added, "to take her back to the Home." "Take her back!" I cried, stung by something in her tone. "But—but why?" "We don’t allow our girls to live in the homes of bachelors," she murmured, lowering her eyes for an instant. "Oh!" I gasped feebly. It is my eternal wrongness that seems to be at the bottom of everything. The picture of the children upon my hands without the girl Alicia swept me with a chill dismay. "It ought to have been reported to us," she said reprovingly. "It really ought." "What ought to have been reported?" I groped in bewilderment. "The change—the transfer. We sent Alicia to Mrs. Pendleton," she explained. "When Mrs. Pendleton—er—died, we ought to have been notified—so we could look after her." "I understand," I murmured weakly. "You see, my sister’s death was so sudden that nobody thought of such things. I didn’t even know she had taken this girl from your Home." In my blundering way I then explained to her how the children came here, of their attachment to Alicia and of my own absurd dependence upon her—which I abruptly realized. I told her quite truthfully, I believe, that now the children could not get on without her. And the bitter thought assailed me that nothing in this world that is pleasant or fitting or agreeable can long be left unshattered; that everything human and sweet and tranquil must be by some human hands undone. What a miserably destructive race we are! "Well," I concluded sadly, "I suppose now you’ll take her away—and what I shall do with these three children is beyond me." To my surprise, as I looked up, I distinctly saw a tear glisten in her eye. She looked away. "You have a great many books," she observed with nervous irrelevance. "The result of a misspent life," I sighed. "Well, I don’t know what to do or say," she said, rising awkwardly. "I’d like to see Alicia and—the other children. And I’ll have to report—I shall call up the matron of the Home on the telephone." "Won’t you do it now?" I eagerly prompted. "I’d better see Alicia first, I think—when will she be in?" "At lunch time," I said; "won’t you stay, or come to lunch?" She seemed to recall that this was that obscene environment, the home of a bachelor. "No, thank you," she murmured primly. "I’d better come again in the afternoon. Would three-thirty do all right?" "Admirably," I told her. "I’ll do the very best I can," she reassured me. "That’s very good of you," I answered from a grateful heart.