"But no one would take me with such clothes, ma'am. They wouldn't look at me or speak to me even in the little shops where I went to ask for work."
Miss Starbrow uttered a curious little laugh.
"What a strange thing it seems," she said, "that a few shillings to buy decent clothes may alter a person's destiny. With the shillings--about as many as the man of God pays for his sirloin--shelter from the weather and temptations to evil, three meals a day, a long pleasant life, husband and children, perhaps, and at last--Heaven. And without them, rags and starvation and the streets, and--well, this is a question for the mighty intellect of a man and a theologian, not for mine. I dare say you don't know what I'm talking about, Fan?"
"Not all, ma'am, but I think I understand a little."
"Very little, I should think. Don't try to understand too much, my poor girl. Perhaps before you are eighty, if you live so long, you will discover that you didn't even understand a little. Ah, Fan, you have been sadly cheated by destiny! Childhood without joy, and girlhood without hope. I wish I could give you happiness to make up for it all, but I can't be Providence to anyone."
"Oh, ma'am, you have made me so happy!" exclaimed Fan, the tears springing to her eyes.
Miss Starbrow frowned a little and turned her face aside. Then she said:
"Just because I fed and dressed and sheltered you, Fan--does happiness come so easily to you?"
"Oh no, ma'am, not that--it isn't that," with such keen distress that she could scarcely speak without a sob.
"How then have I made you happy? Will you not answer me? I took you because I believed that you would trust me, and always speak openly from your heart, and hide nothing."
"Oh, ma'am, I'm afraid to say it. I was so happy because I thought--because--" and here she sunk her voice to a trembling whisper--"I thought that you loved me."
Miss Starbrow put her arm round the girl's waist and drew her against her knees.
"Your instinct was not at fault, Fan," she said in a caressing tone. "I _do_ love you, and loved you when I saw you in your rags, and it pained my heart when I told you to clean my doorsteps as if you had been my sister. No, not a sister, but something better and sweeter; my sisters I do not love at all. And do you know now what I meant, Fan, when I said that there was something you could do for me?"