laying her hand upon his arm. "Oh, Jimmy, I am so sorry!" It was the
first time that she had ever addressed him by his given name, but there
seemed nothing strange or unusual in the occurrence.

"She was such a good little girl," said Harriet.

It was strange that so many should use these same words in connection
with Edith Hudson, and even this girl, so far removed from the sphere in
which Little Eva had existed and who knew something of her past, could
yet call her "good."

It gave Jimmy a new insight into the sweetness and charity of Harriet
Holden's character. "Yes," he said, "her soul and her heart were good
and pure."

"She believed so in you," said the girl. "She thought you were the best
man who ever lived. She told me that you were the only really good man
she had ever known, and her confidence and belief in you were
contagious. You will probably never know all that she did for you. It
was really she that imbued my father and his attorney with a belief in
your innocence, and it was she who influenced the Lizard to take the
stand in your behalf. Yes, she was a very good friend."

"And you have been a good friend," said Jimmy. "In the face of the same
circumstances that turned Miss Compton against me you believed in me.
Your generosity made it possible for me to be defended by the best
attorney in Chicago, but more than all that to me has been your
friendship and the consciousness of your sympathy at a time when, above
all things, I needed sympathy. And now, after all you have done for me I
came to ask still more of you."