“You may set your mind at rest on that point,” said I. “He smuggled her at once aboard the ship, and seems scarcely to have said how d’ye do to her afterwards. That is the mad part of it.”
“Can I be sure?”
“I would stake my life on it,” said I.
“How do you know?”
“Frankness—I may say embarrassing frankness is one of the young lady’s drawbacks.”
He looked greatly relieved. I acquainted him with Carlotta’s antecedents, and outlined the part I had played in the story.
“Then,” said he, “I will see the child back to her home. I will take her there myself. I cannot allow you any longer to have the burden of befriending her, when it is my duty to repair my boy’s wrongdoing.”
I explained to him the terror of Hamdi Effendi’s clutches, and told him of my promise.
“Then what is to be done?” he asked.
“If any kind people could be found to receive her into their family, and bring her up like a Christian, I should hand her over with the greatest of pleasure. If there is one thing I do not require in this house, it is an idle and irresponsible female. But philanthropists are rare. Who will take her?”