“Oh, how sweet of you!” she cried, and began to weep again.
“I mean,” Edward explained hastily, “that I couldn’t leave any woman alone in a place like this.”
“You’re so ch-chivalrous!” she sobbed. “I knew it the moment I heard your voice!”
“I am not chivalrous,” replied Edward firmly; “only—look here! I’ll get a taxi and see you home.”
“I have no home!” she wailed.
“You must live somewhere.”
“I don’t—not any more. Oh, leave me! Leave me! I don’t care!” She clutched his arm again, in that frenzied manner which so startled and annoyed him. “Oh, my hat!” she cried. “It’s raining!”
She was right—the first heavy drops were beginning to fall.
“Oh, my pretty little hat!” she cried.
Now, Edward’s was a just and logical mind, and yet even he had sometimes been illogically moved by trifles. This infantile plaint about a pretty little hat reminded him of certain things Mildred had said, and aroused in him a pity which the strange[Pg 230]r’s tragic and mysterious sorrows had hitherto failed to inspire.