"You may be sure they will take good care not to do that."
"Don't be too sure," Lilian Rosenberg replied. "Matthew Kelson is very fond of me. With a little persuasion he would do anything I asked."
"Then do you think you could bring about a rupture between him and Hamar!" Shiel asked eagerly.
"I might!"
"And you will—you will save Gladys Martin after all!"
Lilian did not reply at once.
"Do you think she is the sort of girl who would marry poverty," she said, evasively, "poverty like this!" and she glanced round the room.
"I won't ask her to!" Shiel exclaimed. "Whilst I have been lying in bed, ill, I have thought of many things—and have come to the conclusion I have no right ever to think of marrying. It is difficult for me to earn enough to keep one person in comfort—and I've lost all hope of ever earning enough to keep two."
"Well, if you don't ask her," Lilian Rosenberg said, "there's one thing, she will never ask you. And I think you are remarkably well out of it. If you do ever marry, marry a girl that has grit—a girl that would be a real 'pal' to you—a girl that would help you to win fame!"