wilful ignorance."

"Speak out, please."

"Of course I knew you must have sanctioned her going last night, though, I
must confess, I still think you did very wrongly; but do you know where she
went this morning?"

Mrs. Levice was put out. She was enough of a Jewess to realize that if you
dislike Jewish comment, you must never step out of the narrowly
conventional Jewish pathway. That Ruth, her only daughter, should be the
subject of vulgar bandying was more bitter than wormwood to her; but that
her own niece could come with these wild conjectures incensed her beyond
endurance.

"I do know," she said in response to the foregoing question. "Ruth is not
a sneak, --she tells me everything; but her enterprises are so mild that
there would be no harm if she left them untold. She called on a poor young
girl who, after a long illness, desires pupils in Spanish."

"A friend of Dr. Kemp."

"Exactly."

"A young girl, unmarried, who, a few weeks ago, through a merciful fate,
lost her child at its birth."

The faint flush on Mrs. Levice's cheek receded.

"Who told you this?" she questioned in an even, low voice.