"Oh, don't do that!" he cried. "Let me see her sometimes—let me hear her voice, and I won't ask a question. See, I haven't even asked her name."
He had come round to my side, dropping his voice to an earnest whisper. But the child caught the last words.
"My name is Winifred," she said in answer to them.
"Good heavens!" exclaimed Roderick, turning deadly pale; while I, seizing the child firmly by the hand, turned a corner abruptly and hastened into Broadway, where, as before on a similar occasion, I took a cable car.
"And yet I have tried to be true to my trust," I repeated over and over to myself. "At the risk of losing Roderick's friendship, I have refused to answer any questions."
"Oh, why did you go and leave the gentleman like that?" asked Winifred, imperiously, as soon as we entered our rooms at the hotel. "It's a shame—I tell you it's a shame!" And she stamped her little foot on the carpet.
"Winifred!" I said severely. "You must be careful!"
"I don't care!" she cried. "I won't be good any more. It was very impolite to run away from that gentleman; and I wanted to talk to him, because I think I knew him once, or perhaps only dreamed about him."
I saw now that the dénouement was coming nearer and nearer. The matter was indeed being taken out of my hands. I determined, however, that I would be true to Niall; and that if some news did not soon come from Ireland, I should remove the child from New York and go with her, perhaps, to Canada. I rejoiced that the holidays were over and that to-morrow Winifred must return to school.