Marjory Valentine came forward. She looked at neither of them, but sat down near the table.
"Well, Madge," said Mrs. Dennison, "there's good news for you, isn't there? Your friend's coming."
Madge, finding (as she thought) sympathy, came to her mother's knee.
"Yes, I'm glad," she said. "Are you glad, mother?"
"Oh, I don't mind," answered Mrs. Dennison, kissing her; but she could not help one glance at Willie Ruston. Bitterly she repented it, for she found Marjory Valentine following it with her open sorrowful eyes. She rose abruptly, and Ruston rose also, and with brief good-nights—Madge being kissed only on strong persuasion—took his leave. The children flocked away to take off their hats, and Marjory was left alone with her hostess.
The girl looked pale, weary, and sad. Mrs. Dennison was stirred to an impulse of compassion. Walking up to where she sat, she bent down as though to kiss her. Marjory looked up. There was a question—it seemed to be a question—in her face. Mrs. Dennison flushed red from neck to forehead, and then grew paler than the pallor she had pitied. The girl's unspoken question seemed to echo hauntingly from every corner of the little room, "Are your lips—clean?"