"Will you take my papa out of prison?"
"My poor child, I fear that is beyond me. Beyond any one now."
She squeezed the clasped hands painfully together, her eyes clung to his face: "No: you can! You can! I heard them say so," she said. "Mr. George Boult and you can take him out if you will. You can do it with money. He said so. You can do it to-day."
"She means go bail for him," Reginald explained under his breath.
"But why should I do that?" Sir Francis asked, turning upon his brother. "Her father was no friend—not even an acquaintance—of mine." He was most anxious that point should be established. "People in—in Mr. Day's position get their friends to bail them," he said to the girl. "And I shall not be present; I am going out of town to-day."
"No! you must not go!" Deleah sobbed. "You must do it. There is no one else. I don't know where to go—I don't know what to do. We none of us know. You must! You must!"
Half because her strength was failing her, and half because it was the attitude of prayer, she went to her knees, her head thrown back, looking up at him, her clasped hands beneath her upturned chin.
How could any man, however cold, reserved, remote, inimical to her cause, even, turn a deaf ear to such an appeal, remain adamant before her helplessness, her trustfulness, her childish beauty and self-abandonment!
"Who sent you to me?" he asked.
"No one. I came," she whispered. The change in his tone had weakened her, she began to shake from head to foot.