When she emerged from the shop she had the illusion of being breathless, and in the midst of a terrific adventure the end of which none could foresee. She was furious against Miss Malkin and against herself. Yet she indignantly justified herself. Was not Louis Fores Mrs. Maiden's nephew, and were not he and she doing the best thing they could together under the difficult circumstances of the old lady's illness? If she was not to co-operate with the old lady's sole relative in Bursley, with whom was she to co-operate? In vain such justifications!... She murderously hated Miss Malkin. She said to herself, without meaning it, that no power should induce her ever to enter the shop again. And she thought: "I can't possibly go into another shop to-night--I can't possibly do it! And yet I must. Why am I such a silly baby?" As they walked slowly along the pavement she was in the wild dream anew, and Louis Fores was her only hope and reliance. She clung to him, though not with her arm. She seemed to know him very intimately, and still he was more enigmatic to her than ever he had been. As for Louis, beneath his tranquil mien of a man of experience and infinite tact, he was undergoing the most extraordinary and delightful sensations, keener even than those which had thrilled him in Rachel's kitchen on the previous evening. The social snob in him had somehow suddenly expired, and he felt intensely the strange charm of going shopping of a Saturday night with a young woman, and making a little purchase here and a little purchase there, and thinking about halfpennies. And in his fancy he built a small house to which he and Rachel would shortly return, and all the brilliant diversions of bachelordom seemed tame and tedious compared to the wondrous existence of this small house. "Now I have to go to Heath's the butcher's," said Rachel, determined at all costs to be a woman and not a silly baby. After that plain announcement her cowardice would have no chance to invent an excuse for not going into another shop. But she added-- "And that'll be all." "I know Master Bob Heath. Known him a long time," said Louis Fores, with amusement in his voice, as though to imply that he could relate strange and titillating matters about Heath if he chose, and indeed that he was a mine of secret lore concerning the citizens. The fact was that he had travelled once to Woore races with the talkative Heath, and that Heath had introduced him to his brother Stanny Heath, a local book-maker of some reputation, from whom Louis had won five pounds ten during the felicitous day. Ever afterwards Bob Heath had effusively saluted Louis on every possible occasion, and had indeed once stopped him in the street and said: "My brother treated you all right, didn't he? Stanny's a true sport." And Louis had to be effusive also. It would never do to be cold to a man from whose brother you had won--and received--five pounds ten on a racecourse.