As a matter of fact she had no concerns of her own, or at least none whose vitality would gain attention. And suddenly her friendly sense of being a part of this flowing life dissolved sourly into mockery. She was in it and not of it--again the hostile critic. And then it occurred to her that perhaps momentarily she was a little lonely. And her utter impotence in this huge careless city heightened this feeling. She could make no headway against the current of this life. The remarkable persistent vitality of the thing around her made her feel totally unimportant and quite helpless. The feeling was far from pleasant, but it was salutary, and stimulus for the first remedy at hand, and the natural depression of impotence did not overcome the exhilaration of curiosity. When she reached Washington Square again, she said something of this to Miss Wardrop, who nodded comprehendingly. "Every one feels that way for a time," she said; "it's like sitting out a cotillion by one's self. What you need is something or somebody to pull you into the whirl." "I suppose that is so," agreed the girl,--"but where am I to find it--or him? I don't know anybody who is in. Of course I have Uncle Silas's letter to Mr. Wintermuth, but I didn't really know whether I'd have the courage to use it or not." "Who may Mr. Wintermuth be?" demanded her aunt. "A friend of Uncle Silas, and the President of the Guardian Fire Insurance Company." "Fire Insurance? A fire insurance company? Wait one moment. Jenks. . . . Jenks! Bring me that envelope from the mantelpiece. . . . No," she added, "my policy is not in the Guardian. I thought perhaps it might be." "What is the matter?" inquired her niece. "Have you had a fire?" "Yes, I have," returned her aunt, "or rather Jenks has. He burned off the lamp shade from my reading lamp. And Jane Vanderdecken says because he did it out of sheer clumsiness I cannot ask the company to pay for it." Helen remembered the shade in question, which had been in the eyes of all save its owner a horror upon horrors, a mausoleum preserving, apparently for all time, the ghastly glories of a dead era of alleged ornamentation. So it was with dubious sympathy that she said:-- "I don't know whether Jane Vanderdecken is right or not." "You can go and find out. Mr. What's-his-name can tell you, even if it isn't his company that will have to pay." And in this way it came about that Helen found herself, not many days later, descending from the Elevated Station at Cortlandt Street, and turning her steps eastward toward William Street. It was half-past ten when she found herself before a portal on which were the words: The Guardian Fire Insurance Company of the City of New York.