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rt coy :
0 winp MaRgaREr MMi
not! He ig ‘nothing to ‘me! You—you shall have him |
back! Oh; Heaven! :Oh, Heaven!’ and, with acry that
rang through the room, she fell forward on her face. ©.
\ 8) GHAPTER XVI
LOTTIE Bevorr looked down at the prostrate figure. of —
_\Margaret with a pallor that made the carefully-applied
‘paint on her face look yellow by contrast. 7
_ .\ For a minute or two she felt frightened and had an idea
of calling for help. Lottie was not altogether a bad girl;
- \indeed, the persons who are either altogether bad or al- |
- together good do not exist in real life, but only in the »
pages of some novels. Ce,
.\ She had been brought up in a hard school, in which each
“has to struggle for itself, and where each knows that with- |
out doubt the devil will take the hindmost. :
. ¢Mr. Austin Ambrose had worked upon her feelings and ©
_ tempted her to do this thing, and she had done it. Butin —
the doing of it she had felt distinctly uncomfortable. In:
the first place she had discovered that Margaret was a.
lady; if she had been one of Lottie’s own class, Lottie
would have had no compunction whatever. Then Mar-
£aret’s beauty, which affected everybody more or less,
had had its effect upon Lottie; then again, Margaret had
treated her so kindly and gently; and altogether Lottie
Belvoir had not had‘a particularly good time of it.
. She got the glass of water and sprinkled it over.tho —
white beautiful face, and chafed her hands, and presently
fargaret opened her eyes, and smiling faintly, murmured
— air!? — \ co :
Then, as memory returned to its seat, the white feat-
ures were convulsed, and shrinking away from Lottie she
said, in a ghastly whisper: ‘ ae
it ,, Lt is dll true, then? I—I thought that I had dreamt -
“Yes, it is all true,” said Lottie, rather sullenly. ‘And .
now I want to know what you are going to do, miss?”
“Margaret winced at the “miss.” More surely than any
other word could have done, it brought home to her the
_ fact of her ruin and degradation. ~ oo
: Slowly she dragged herself to a chair, and sank into it, -
refusing with a slight.shudder Lottie’s proffered arm.
~ — “What I am going to do?’ she repeated in a dull, be- ©
numbed fashion. ‘I do not know! Yes I—I must go
away! T must go at once, before—before he returns.”
.. that is the best thing you can do, miss,’’ said Lottie.
It goes against me to drive you away, put what can I
do? Heismyhusband—” = :