This street, or rather alley, is known as Devereux Passage. On reaching the bottom of it, the poor hunted creature found herself in a sort of cul-de-sac. It was all over. There was no escape. The street ended. On the left were the closed iron gates of the Temple. In front of her was a wall. To the right her flight was also stopped, for there the narrow passage that leads off to Essex Street had wooden barriers placed across it, the pavement being up for repair of drain or water-pipes: so this too seemed to her hurried gaze, and in the dim light, impassable as the dead wall in front. She was at bay; trembling, faint, and sick with despair, she looked wildly around for any chance of escape. She heard the man's step coming down the passage--slowly too, with cruel deliberation; her father knew well that there was no way out, that she was a secured prisoner. There was a doorway by her: she crouched into it, and with her breath bursting out in difficult sobs, and her heart beating as if to break, clung to the door-handle with all her strength. She determined that she would not be torn away. Then her head swam round--the heavy tread approached--she shut her eyes in her agony. When he was just in front of her the sound of the man's step ceased. There was a pause before his words came. CHAPTER V. IN THE TEMPLE. A pause of a few seconds only, but seeming long terrible minutes, while she waited for the harsh satirical tones of her father's voice, which she knew so well. At last the words came. "You seem to be unwell; can I be of assistance to you in any way?" She started, opened her eyes wide, and stared in the speaker's face. It was not her father! For it happened that the solicitor had not seen her, and had continued his route along Fleet Street, when she darted into Devereux Court. The steps she had heard behind her were not her father's. The person who had spoken was a stranger, young and of pleasing exterior. It was no other than Mr. Thomas Hudson. On his way to the Devereux Court entrance to the Temple, he had seen this girl crouching in the doorway. With the gallantry and sympathy of an Irishman, and really thinking that she was ill, he came to the rescue. Not that his motives for this were altogether unselfish. He saw that the girl was young and graceful of form, and her face, he imagined, must be agreeable also, to be consistent with the rest. He had nothing to do for the moment, and was only too glad to fall into an adventure with a pretty woman. She looked at him wildly for a few seconds, then cried: "Why, you are not--" and she checked herself. "No I am not," he promptly replied; "are you afraid of someone then. Is any blackguard following you?" Her eyes wandered round like those of an animal in presence of a great danger. Weariness and the reaction after her excitement had dulled her courage. "Yes, I am hunted," she said at last, sadly.