"Stephen," she said, "I thought that you were going to bring mother up with you." He laughed hardly. "Your mother wasn't ready," he said. "We can send for her later." "Don't you think, Stephen," she pleaded, "that it would be nice for me to stay with Mrs. Brown until--until we are married?" "If you go to Mrs. Brown," he said gruffly, "you can stay with her. That's all! I won't be fooled about any longer. Once and for all, are you coming?" She took a hesitating step forward, but Macheson led her firmly towards another hansom. "No!" he answered, "she is not. You know where she will be when you have the marriage license." Stephen sprang into his cab with an oath. Even then Letty would have followed him, but Macheson held her arm. "You stay here, Letty," he said firmly. She covered her face with her hands, but she obeyed. CHAPTER X MYSTERIES IN MAYFAIR That night, and for many nights afterwards, Macheson devoted himself to his work in the East End. The fascination of the thing grew upon him; he threw himself into his task with an energy which carried him often out of his own life and made forgetfulness an easy task. Night after night they came, these tired, white-faced women, with a sprinkling of sullen, dejected-looking men; night after night he pleaded and reasoned with them, striving with almost passionate earnestness to show them how to make the best of the poor thing they called life. Gradually his efforts began to tell upon himself. He grew thinner, there were shadows under his eyes, a curious intangible depression seemed to settle upon him. Holderness one night sought him out and insisted upon dinner together. "Look here, Victor," he said, "I have a bone to pick with you. You'd better listen! Don't sit there staring round the place as though you saw ghosts everywhere." Macheson smiled mirthlessly. "But that is just what I do see," he answered. "The conscience of every man who knows must be haunted with them! The ghosts of starving men and unsexed women! What keeps their hands from our throats, Dick?" "Common sense, you idiot," Holderness answered cheerfully. "There's a refuse heap for every one of nature's functions. You may try to rake it out and cleanse it, but there isn't much to be done. Hang that mission work, Victor! It's broken more hearts than anything else on earth! A man can but do what he may." "The refuse heap is man's work!" Macheson muttered. "But not wholly his responsibility," Holderness declared. "We're part of the machine, but remember the wheels are driven by fate, or God, or whatever the hidden motive force of the universe may be. Don't lose yourself, Macheson! Sentiment's a good thing under control. It's a sickly master." "You call it sentiment, if one feels the horror of this garbage heap! Come to-night and look into their faces."