Fair sat silent and frightened. What was she to do? She looked up presently, and said timidly: “Maybe your mother would let me come and stay at your house? I would pay her whatever she asked as soon as I got my wages.” Alice Stevens put her arms around her friend, and hid her reddening cheeks against her shoulder. “Oh, Fair, I wish she would, but”—with a half sob—“I asked her, and she said no, that Carl Bernicci might prosecute her for harboring his disobedient wife. Don’t blame me, dear; it wasn’t my fault.” “No, dear, I don’t blame you. Give my love to[Pg 104] Lucy. I thank you both,” Fair answered, with a sort of apathetic despair, and, after a little, she told Alice of all that had happened last night. [Pg 104] “You see how it is. I am always in danger from him, yet I cannot find one friend to stand by me in my trouble,” she cried bitterly. “I am so sorry! I only wish I might stay,” sobbed Alice Stevens, crying out of sympathy. She stayed a little longer, then rose, saying anxiously: “Fair, don’t you think you can get that good woman to stay with you to-night?” “I will try, dear, but then I shall have no one to go to work with me to-morrow, and, oh, I am such a coward I dare not go out alone,” Fair answered dejectedly. Alice regarded her in perplexed silence a moment, then blurted out: “Fair, I’m afraid you’ll have to give in and live with him for the sake of peace.” The beautiful brown eyes flashed angrily, and Fair cried out: “That is what they all say, but I will never do it—never! Why, Alice, if I could forgive him the deception he practiced on me, I could never[Pg 105] pardon the death of my mother, which he caused. Before I would live with such a fiend as Carl Bernicci I would kill myself!” [Pg 105] Alice went away sad at heart, but not half so sad as the hapless girl she left behind her, for a new suspicion had entered Fair’s mind. She began to fear that
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