She was rather wrapped up than dressed, and her hair, thin and pale-coloured, was tied in a ragged knot. She wore slippers, the upper parts of which still adhered to the soles only by miracle. It looked very much as if the same relation subsisted between her frame and the life that informed it, for there was no blood in her cheeks, no lustre in her eye. The baby at her bosom moaned in the act of sucking; one knew not how the poor woman could supply sustenance to another being. The children were not dirty nor uncared for, but their clothing hung very loosely upon them; their flesh was unhealthy, their voices had an unnatural sound. Sidney stepped up to the bed and gave his hand. ‘I’m so glad you’ve come before Clara,’ said Mrs. Hewett. ‘I hoped you would. But she can’t be long, an’ I want to speak to you first. It’s a bad night, isn’t it? Yes, I feel it in my throat, and it goes right through my chest—just ’ere, look! And I haven’t slep’ not a hour a night this last week; it makes me feel that low. I want to get to the Orspital, if I can, in a day or two.’ ‘But doesn’t the doctor come still?’ asked Sidney, drawing a chair near to her. ‘Well, I didn’t think it was right to go on payin’ him, an’ that’s the truth. I’ll go to the Orspital, an’ they’ll give me somethin’. I look bad, don’t I, Sidney?’ ‘You look as if you’d no business to be out of bed,’ returned the young man in a grumbling voice. ‘Oh, I _can’t_ lie still, so it’s no use talkin’! But see, I want to speak about Clara. That woman Mrs. Tubbs has been here to see me, talkin’ an’ talkin’. She says she’ll give Clara five shillin’ a week, as well as board an’ lodge her. I don’t know what to do about it, that I don’t. Clara, she’s that set on goin’, an’ her father’s that set against it. It seems as if it ‘ud be a good thing, don’t it, Sidney? I know _you_ don’t want her to go, but what’s to be done? What _is_ to be done?’ Her wailing voice caused the baby to wail likewise. Kirkwood looked about the room with face set in anxious discontent. ‘Is it no use, Mrs. Hewett?’ he exclaimed suddenly, turning to her. ‘Does she mean it? Won’t she ever listen to me?’ The woman shook her head miserably; her eyes filled with tears. ‘I’ve done all I could,’ she replied, half sobbing. ‘I have; you know I have, Sidney! She’s that ’eadstrong, it seems as if she wouldn’t listen to nobody—at least nobody as we knows anything about.’ ‘What do you mean by that?’ he inquired abruptly. ‘Do you think there’s any one else?’