His cheeks burned with a sort of shame. She had dared to think this of him--and that afterwards he should have brought the girl to her to beg for shelter! There were a dozen things which he ought to have said, which came flashing from his brain to find themselves somehow imprisoned behind his tightly locked lips. He said nothing. She passed slowly, almost unwillingly, down the hall. The maid wrapped her coat around her--still he stood like a statue. He watched her pass through the opened door and enter the electric brougham. He watched it even glide away. Then he, too, went and joined Holderness, who was waiting outside. "Hail, succourer of damsels in distress!" Holderness called out, producing his cigar-case. "Jolly glad you got rid of her! It would have meant the waiting-room at St. Pancras and an all-night sitting. Smoke, my son, and we will walk home--unless you mind this bit of rain. Was her ladyship gracious?" "She was not," Macheson answered grimly, "but she is keeping the girl. I'd like to walk," he added, lighting a cigar. "A very elegant lady," Holderness remarked, "but I thought she looked a bit up in the air. Did you notice her pearls, Victor?" Macheson nodded. "Wonderful, weren't they?" "Yes. She wears them round her neck, and these--these wear always their shame," he added, pushing gently away a woman who clutched at his arm. "Funny thing, isn't it? What are they worth? Ten thousand pounds, very likely. A lot of money for gewgaws--to hang upon a woman's body. Shall we ever have a revolution in London, do you think, Victor?" "Who knows?" Macheson answered wearily. "Not a political one, perhaps, but the other might come. The sewers underneath are pretty full." They passed along in silence for a few minutes. Neither the drizzling rain nor the lateness of the hour could keep away that weary procession of sad, staring-eyed women, who seemed to come from every shadow, and vanish Heaven knows where. Macheson gripped his companion by the arm. "Holderness," he cried, "for God's sake let's get out of it. I shall choke presently. We'll take a side street." But Holderness held his arm in a grip of iron. "No," he said, "these are the things which you must feel. I want you to feel them. I mean you to." "It's heart-breaking, Dick." Holderness smiled faintly. "I know how you feel," he declared. "I've gone through it myself. You are a Christian, aren't you--almost an orthodox Christian?" "I am not sure!" "Don't waste your pity, then," Holderness declared. "God will look after these. It's the women with the pearl necklaces and the scorn in their eyes who're looking for hell. Your friend in the electric brougham, for instance. Can't you see her close her eyes and draw away her skirts if she should brush up against one of these?" "It's hard to blame her," Macheson declared. Holderness looked down at him pityingly.