SANCTUARY
by those he cares for. Your influence is paramount with him now—but if you turn from him just when he needs your help, who can say what the result will be?"
The argument, though impressively delivered, was hardly of a nature to carry conviction to its hearer; but it was perhaps for that very reason that she suddenly and unexpectedly replied to it by sinking back into her seat with a burst of tears. To Mrs. Peyton, however, tears were the signal of surrender, and, at Kate's side in an instant, she hastened to temper her triumph with magnanimity.
"Don't think I don't feel with you; but we must both forget ourselves for our boy's sake. I told him I should come back with your promise."
The arm she had slipped about Kate's shoulder fell back with the girl's start. Kate had seen in a flash what capital would be made of her emotion.
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