She turned away.
“Wouldn’t you do anything to help another girl?” cried Tommy. “She’s about your age too. Won’t you save her from their clutches?”
“You mean Jane Finn?”
“Yes.”
“It is her you came here to look for? Yes?”
“That’s it.”
The girl looked at him, then passed her hand across her forehead.
“Jane Finn. Always I hear that name. It is familiar.”
Tommy came forward eagerly.
“You must know something about her?”
But the girl turned away abruptly.
“I know nothing—only the name.” She walked towards the door. Suddenly she uttered a cry. Tommy stared. She had caught sight of the picture he had laid against the wall the night before. For a moment he caught a look of terror in her eyes. As inexplicably it changed to relief. Then abruptly she went out of the room. Tommy could make nothing of it. Did she fancy that he had meant to attack her with it? Surely not. He rehung the picture on the wall thoughtfully.
Three more days went by in dreary inaction. Tommy felt the strain telling on his nerves. He saw no one but Conrad and Annette, and the girl had become dumb. She spoke only in monosyllables. A kind of dark suspicion smouldered in her eyes. Tommy felt that if this solitary confinement went on much longer he would go mad. He gathered from