She suddenly clutched at Bettina's arm.

For a minute her gaze was wild as she looked up.
"Betty," she cried out.

"No! No! No! I can't believe it! I can't! I can't!" That just this thing could have taken place in her, Bettina had never thought.

As she had reflected on her way from the station, the impossible is what one finds one's self face to face with.

Twelve years should not have changed a pretty blonde thing of nineteen to a worn, unintelligent-looking dowdy of the order of dowdiness which seems to have lived beyond age and sex.