"I am not sure that is quite sufficient in itself," said Ormsgill reflectively. "Still, Father Tiebout would scarcely have suggested sending her to them unless he had felt reasonably certain that they would show her kindness."
His companion's face hardened. "They are people of blameless lives. There are, perhaps, two or three such in that city. You could count upon the woman receiving kindness from them, but one would have you quite clear about the fact that my recommendation is necessary. It is, of course, in my power to withhold it, and if it is given you will undertake not to claim the woman again?"
Ormsgill looked at him with a little smile. "I have no wish to claim her, though I have only that assurance to offer you, and I must tell you that I am going to the coast. There are, however, one or two conditions. She must be treated well, and paid for her services."
"That would be arranged. It is convenient that she should understand what would be required of her. I will send for her."
Ormsgill made a sign of concurrence, and in another five minutes Anita stood before them, slight and lithe in form, and very comely, but with apprehension and anxiety in her brown face. The priest spoke to her concisely in a coldly even voice, and it was evident that the course he mentioned was one she had no wish to take. Then he turned from her to Ormsgill as she stretched out her hands with a little gesture of appeal towards the latter.
"It is your will that I should go away and live with these people?" she said.
Ormsgill knew that the priest was watching him, and that there was only one answer, but he shrank from uttering it. The girl's eyes were beseeching, and she looked curiously forlorn. She was a castaway without kindred or country, one who had lived the untrammeled life of the bush, and he feared that she would find the restraints of the city intolerably galling.
"It is," he said gravely.
The girl stood very still a moment or two looking at him, and Ormsgill felt the blood creep into his face. He was, in all probability, the only man who had ever shown her kindness, and he recognized that she too had misunderstood his motives and regarded him as rather more than her rescuer. Then as he made no sign she flung out her hands again, hopelessly this time, and slowly straightened herself.
"I go," she said simply and turned away from them.