"Between now and to-morrow night?" she wondered, with sad contempt.
"Why not? Anything can happen between a night and a night." He looked at her with shrewd appreciation: "You have taken yourself so seriously," said he, "that you've pretty nearly muddled yourself into being tragic. Those fellows knew who they were dealing with when they tackled you. They could bet the limit you'd never tell. So long as you didn't tell, so long as they had nobody but you to deal with, they had you where they wanted you. But now maybe things might happen that haven't been printed in the program."
"What things?" she mocked somberly.
"I don't know, yet," he admitted, "But I do know there is always a way out of everything except the grave. The thing is to find the right way. That's up to the Padre and me. Parson, would you mind going after Madame now, please? The sooner we go the better."
Have I not said my mother is the most wonderful of women? I waked her in the small hours with the startling information that Mary Virginia was downstairs in John Flint's workroom, and that she herself must dress and accompany her home. And my mother, though she looked her stark bewilderment, plagued me with no questions.
"She is in great trouble, and she needs you. Hurry."
Madame slid out of her bed and reached for her neatly folded garments.
"Wait in the hall, Armand; I will be with you in ten minutes." And she was, wrapped and hatted.
Once in the workroom, she cast a deep and searching woman-glance at the pale girl in the chair. Her face was so sweet with motherliness and love and pity, and that profound comprehension the best women show to each other, that I felt my throat contract. Gathered into Madame's embrace, Mary Virginia clung to her old friend dumbly. Madame had but one question:
"My child, have you told John Flint and my son what this trouble of yours is?"