"WHEN your mother was alive were you ever out with her afternightfall in the streets of a great city?"

In those extraordinary terms Mercy Merrick opened theconfidential interview which Grace Roseberry had forced on her.Grace answered, simply, "I don't understand you."

"I will put it in another way," said the nurse. Its unnaturalhardness and sternness of tone passed away from her voice, andits native gentleness and sadness returned, as she made thatreply. "You read the newspapers like the rest of the world," shewent on; "have you ever read of your unhappy fellow- creatures(the starving outcasts of the population) whom Want has driveninto Sin?"

Still wondering, Grace answered that she had read of such thingsoften, in newspapers and in books.

"Have you heard--when those starving and sinning fellow-creatureshappened to be women--of Refuges established to protect andreclaim them?"

The wonder in Grace 's mind passed away, and a vague suspicion ofsomething painful to come took its place. "These areextraordinary questions," she said, nervously. "What do youmean?"

"Answer me," the nurse insisted. "Have you heard of the Refuges?Have you heard of the Women?"

"Yes."

"Move your chair a little further away from me." She paused. Hervoice, without losing its steadiness, fell to its lowest tones."_I_ was once of those women," she said, quietly.

Grace sprang to her feet with a faint cry. She stoodpetrified--incapable of uttering a word.

"_I_ have been in a Refuge," pursued the sweet, sad voice of theother woman." _I_ have been in a Prison. Do you still wish to bemy friend? Do you still insist on sitting close by me and takingmy hand?" She waited for a reply, and no reply came. "You see youwere wrong," she went on, gently, "when you called me cruel--andI was right when I told you I was kind."

At that appeal Grace composed herself, and spoke. "I don't wishto offend you--" she began, confusedly.

Mercy Merrick stopped her there.

"You don't offend me," she said, without the faintest note ofdispleasure in her tone. "I am accustomed to stand in the pilloryof my own past life. I sometimes ask myself if it was all myfault. I sometimes wonder if Society had no duties toward me whenI was a child selling matches in the street--when I was ahard-working girl fainting at my needle for want of food." Hervoice faltered a little for the first time as it pronounced thosewords; she waited a moment, and recovered herself. "It's too lateto dwell on these things now," she said, resignedly. "Society cansubscribe to reclaim me; but Society can't take me back. You seeme here in a place of trust--patiently, humbly, doing all thegood I can. It doesn't matter! Here, or elsewhere, what I _am_can never alter what I _was_. For three years past all that asincerely penitent woman can do I have done. It doesn't matter!Once let my past story be known, and the shadow of it covers me;the kindest people shrink."

She waited again. Would a word of sympathy come to comfort herfrom the other woman's lips? No! Miss Roseberry was shocked; MissRoseberry was confused. "I am very sorry for you," was all thatMiss Roseberry could say.

"Everybody is sorry for me," answered the nurse, as patiently asever; "everybody is kind to me. But the lost place is not to beregained. I can't get back! I can't get back?" she cried, with apassionate outburst of despair--checked instantly the moment ithad escaped her. "Shall I tell you what my experience has been?"she resumed. "Will you hear the story of Magdalen--in moderntimes?"

Grace drew back a step; Mercy instantly understood her.

"I am going to tell you nothing that you need shrink fromhearing," she said. "A lady in your position would not understandthe trials and the struggles that I have passed through. My storyshall begin at the Refuge. The matron sent me out to service withthe character that I had honestly earned--the character of areclaimed woman. I justified the confidence placed in me; I was afaithful servant. One day my mistress sent for me--a kindmistress, if ever there was one yet. 'Mercy, I am sorry for you;it has come out that I took you from a Refuge; I shall lose everyservant in the house; you must go.' I went back to thematron--another kind woman. She received me like a mother. 'Wewill try again, Mercy; don't be cast down.' I told you I had beenin Canada?"

Grace began to feel interested in spite of herself. She answeredwith something like warmth in her tone. She returned to herchair--placed at its safe and significant distance from thechest.

The nurse went on:

"My next place was in Canada, with an officer's wife: gentlefolkswho had emigrated. More kindness; and, this time, a pleasant,peaceful life for me. I said to myself, 'Is the lost placeregained? _Have_ I got back?' My mistress died. New people cameinto our neighborhood. There was a young lady among them--mymaster began to think of another wife. I have the misfortune (inmy situation) to be what is called a handsome woman; I rouse thecuriosity of strangers. The new people asked questions about me;my master's answers did not satisfy them. In a word, they foundme out. The old story again! 'Mercy, I am very sorry; scandal isbusy with you and with me; we are innocent, but there is no helpfor it--we must part.' I left the place; having gained oneadvantage during my stay in Canada, which I find of use to mehere."

"What is it?"

"Our nearest neighbors were French-Canadians. I learned to speakthe French language."

"Did you return to London?"

"Where else could I go, without a character?" said Mercy, sadly."I went back again to the matron. Sickness had broken out in theRefuge; I made myself useful as a nurse. One of the doctors wasstruck with me--'fell in love' with me, as the phrase is. Hewould have married me. The nurse, as an honest woman, was boundto tell him the truth. He never appeared again. The old story! Ibegan to be weary of saying to myself, 'I can't get back! I can'tget back!' Despair got hold of me, the despair that hardens theheart. I might have committed suicide; I might even have driftedback into my old life--but for one man."

At those last words her voice--quiet and even through the earlierpart of her sad story--began to falter once more. She stopped,following silently the memories and associations roused in her bywhat she had just said. Had she forgotten the presence of anotherperson in the room? Grace's curiosity left Grace no resource butto say a word on her side.

"Who was the man?" she asked. "How did he befriend you?"

"Befriend me? He doesn't even know that such a person as I am isin existence."

That strange answer, naturally enough, only strengthened theanxiety of Grace to hear more. "You said just now--" she began.

"I said just now that he saved me. He did save me; you shall hearhow. One Sunday our regular clergyman at the Refuge was not ableto officiate. His place was taken by a stranger, quite a youngman. The matron told us the stranger's name was Julian Gray. Isat in the back row of seats, under the shadow of the gallery,where I could see him without his seeing me. His text was fromthe words, 'Joy shall be in heaven over one sinner thatrepenteth, more than over ninety and nine just persons, whichneed no repentance. 'What happier women might have thought of hissermon I cannot say; there was not a dry eye among us at theRefuge. As for me, he touched my heart as no man has touched itbefore or since. The hard despair melted in me at the sound ofhis voice; the weary round of my life showed its nobler sideagain while he spoke. From that time I have accepted my hard lot,I have been a patient woman. I might have been something more, Imight have been a happy woman, if I could have prevailed onmyself to speak to Julian Gray."

"What hindered you from speaking to him?"

"I was afraid."

"Afraid of what?"

"Afraid of making my hard life harder still."

A woman who could have sympathized with her would perhaps haveguessed what those words meant. Grace was simply embarrassed byher; and Grace failed to guess.

"I don't understand you," she said.

There was no alternative for Mercy but to own the truth in plainwords. She sighed, and said the words. "I was afraid I mightinterest him in my sorrows, and might set my heart on him inreturn." The utter absence of any fellow-feeling with her onGrace's side expressed itself unconsciously in the plainestterms.

"You!" she exclaimed, in a tone of blank astonishment.

The nurse rose slowly to her feet. Grace's expression of surprisetold her plainly--almost brutally--that her confession had gonefar enough.

"I astonish you?" she said. "Ah, my young lady, you don't knowwhat rough usage a woman's heart can bear, and still beat truly!Before I saw Julian Gray I only knew men as objects of horror tome. Let us drop the subject. The preacher at the Refuge isnothing but a remembrance now--the one welcome remembrance of mylife! I have nothing more to tell you. You insisted on hearing mystory--you have heard it."

"I have notheard how you found employment here," said Grace, continuing theconversation with uneasy politeness, as she best might.

Mercy crossed the room, and slowly raked together the last livingembers of the fire.

"The matron has friends in France," she answered, "who areconnected with the military hospitals. It was not difficult toget me the place, under those circumstances. Society can find ause for me here. My hand is as light, my words of comfort are aswelcome, among those suffering wretches" (she pointed to the roomin which the wounded men were lying) "as if I was the mostreputable woman breathing. And if a stray shot comes my waybefore the war is over--well! Society will be rid of me on easyterms."

She stood looking thoughtfully into the wreck of the fire--as ifshe saw in it the wreck of her own life. Common humanity made itan act of necessity to say something to her. Graceconsidered--advanced a step toward her--stopped--and took refugein the most trivial of all the common phrases which one humanbeing can address to another.

"If there is anything I can do for you--" she began. Thesentence, halting there, was never finished. Miss Roseberry wasjust merciful enough toward the lost woman who had rescued andsheltered her to feel that it was needless to say more.

The nurse lifted her noble head and advanced slowly toward thecanvas screen to return to her duties. "Miss Roseberry might havetaken my hand!" she thought to herself, bitterly. No! MissRoseberry stood there at a distance, at a loss what to say next."What can you do for me?" Mercy asked, stung by the cold courtesyof her companion into a momentary outbreak of contempt. "Can youchange my identity? Can you give me the name and the place of aninnocent woman? If I only had your chance! If I only had yourreputation and your prospects!" She laid one hand over her bosom,and controlled herself. "Stay here," she resumed, "while I goback to my work. I will see that your clothes are dried. Youshall wear my clothes as short a time as possible."

With those melancholy words--touchingly, not bitterly spoken--shemoved to pass into the kitchen, when she noticed that thepattering sound of the rain against the window was audible nomore. Dropping the canvas for the moment, she retraced her steps,and, unfastening the wooden shutter, looked out.

The moon was rising dimly in the watery sky; the rain had ceased;the friendly darkness which had hidden the French position fromthe German scouts was lessening every moment. In a few hours more(if nothing happened) the English lady might resume her journey.In a few hours more the morning would dawn.

Mercy lifted her hand to close the shutter. Before she couldfasten it the report of a rifle-shot reached the cottage from oneof the distant posts. It was followed almost instantly by asecond report, nearer and louder than the first. Mercy paused,with the shutter in her hand, and listened intently for the nextsound.