An assistant in the shop, coming out to know the cause of the hubbub, recognized her and had her brought indoors. The policeman on the beat soon shouldered his way in. They put poor Unity on a shutter, covered her with rugs, and, followed by a tail of idlers, bore her to the house. John came home soon afterwards and found an agitated Aunt Gladys in process of being reassured by a kindly doctor that Unity was not dead. The wound, though ugly and painful, was little more than flesh deep. The hat-pin had glanced off a corset bone and penetrated obliquely. Straightly driven, however, it would have been a deadly thrust. Of the murderous intent there could hardly be any doubt. A sergeant of police was also waiting for John; but John let him wait, and rushed in his bull-like way upstairs. Unity, who had long since recovered consciousness, lay in bed, her wound tended, a cheerful fire lit, and Phoebe in attendance. John dismissed the latter with a gesture and flung himself on his knees by the head of the bed. “'My God! child, what has happened?” For all the difference of surroundings,--the pretty room and fine linen,--the common little face on the pillow was singularly like that which he had seen in the orphanage infirmary. But there was a deeper trust in the girl's eyes, for they were lit with a flash of joy at his great distress. She recounted simply what had occurred. “You saw the woman disappear?” “I think so. It was all so quick.” It was a woman's stab. What man would use a hat-pin? And there could be only one woman alive who would stab Unity. “Did you recognize her?” His voice was hoarse, and his rugged face full of pain. She regarded him steadily. “No, Guardian.” “It was not--she?” “No,” said Unity. “Are you sure?” Unity clenched her hands and turned away, and her eyes grew hard. “If it was, I should have known her.” John rose to his feet and stood over her, his arms folded, and looked at her from beneath his heavy brows. Unity met his gaze. And so they remained for a second or two, and each knew that the other knew who had dealt the blow. “It was n't her,” said Unity. The words were stamped with finality. John, meeting the girl's set gaze, had a glimpse of rocky strata far beneath. No process of question invented by man would induce her to unsay the words. “There's a police sergeant downstairs,” said he. “I did n't see no woman either,” said Unity, significantly. And John did not notice her unusual relapse into orphanage speech. Soon afterward he left her and joined the sergeant in the hall. The policeman asked the stereotyped questions. John replied that Miss Blake--it was, as far as he knew, the first time he had given Unity her full style and title, and the name sounded odd in his ears--that Miss Blake had seen nothing of her assailant and could give no information whatever. “You suspect nobody?”