assertions that he saw no way of helping her, "you can, at
least, even if you won't say a word to the others, tell me
frankly and fairly--and quite between ourselves--your
personal opinion of Miss Viner, since you've known her so
much longer than we have."

He protested that, if he had known her longer, he had known
her much less well, and that he had already, on this point,
convinced Anna of his inability to pronounce an opinion.

Madame de Chantelle drew a deep sigh of intelligence. "Your
opinion of Mrs. Murrett is enough! I don't suppose you
pretend to conceal THAT? And heaven knows what other
unspeakable people she's been mixed up with. The only
friends she can produce are called Hoke...Don't try to
reason with me, Mr. Darrow. There are feelings that go
deeper than facts...And I KNOW she thought of studying
for the stage..." Madame de Chantelle raised the corner of
her lace handkerchief to her eyes. "I'm old-fashioned--like
my furniture," she murmured. "And I thought I could count
on you, Mr. Darrow..."


When Darrow, that night, regained his room, he reflected
with a flash of irony that each time he entered it he
brought a fresh troop of perplexities to trouble its serene
seclusion. Since the day after his arrival, only forty-
eight hours before, when he had set his window open to the
night, and his hopes had seemed as many as its stars, each
evening had brought its new problem and its renewed