It was all told in snatches, but the thought of this girl, delicate and refined and well-bred, thrust out into the streets at such a time, without a penny, and with no place to go, made Barry's blood boil. Again came that intense desire to do something for her, accompanied by that same maddening sense of helplessness he had felt before.
"You were hurrying when I saw you first," he said at length.
She moved her shoulders a little. "It was partly to keep warm," she explained quietly, "and partly because I had just thought of a sort of forlorn hope."
"And that was——"
"A girl who used to work with me in the wholesale house; she was very nice, and we got to be good friends. She used to live on Forty-eighth Street, and I thought she would take me in to-night."
"How long is it since you've seen her?" Barry asked.
"Some months. I was tired, and it's a long way to Forty-eighth Street."
She tried to speak lightly, but Lawrence could see that old look of desperation, banished for a time, again lurking in her eyes.
"But what if she's moved?" he asked. "What if you shouldn't find her at the old address?"
She tried to smile, but her lips only quivered. And though she held her head high, like the thoroughbred she was, the expression in her eyes cut Barry to the quick.