should be so glad if you did know better, but I am so very
much afraid that I must know best!'

Lizzie asked her, laughing outright, whether she ever saw her own face
or heard her own voice?

'I suppose so,' returned Bella; 'I look in the glass often enough, and I
chatter like a Magpie.'

'I have seen your face, and heard your voice, at any rate,' said Lizzie,
'and they have tempted me to say to you--with a certainty of not going
wrong--what I thought I should never say to any one. Does that look
ill?'

'No, I hope it doesn't,' pouted Bella, stopping herself in something
between a humoured laugh and a humoured sob.

'I used once to see pictures in the fire,' said Lizzie playfully, 'to
please my brother. Shall I tell you what I see down there where the fire
is glowing?'

They had risen, and were standing on the hearth, the time being come for
separating; each had drawn an arm around the other to take leave.

'Shall I tell you,' asked Lizzie, 'what I see down there?'

'Limited little b?' suggested Bella with her eyebrows raised.

'A heart well worth winning, and well won. A heart that, once won, goes
through fire and water for the winner, and never changes, and is never
daunted.'

'Girl's heart?' asked Bella, with accompanying eyebrows. Lizzie nodded.
'And the figure to which it belongs--'

Is yours,' suggested Bella.

'No. Most clearly and distinctly yours.'

So the interview terminated with pleasant words on both sides, and with
many reminders on the part of Bella that they were friends, and pledges
that she would soon come down into that part of the country again. There
with Lizzie returned to her occupation, and Bella ran over to the little
inn to rejoin her company.

'You look rather serious, Miss Wilfer,' was the Secretary's first
remark.

'I feel rather serious,' returned Miss Wilfer.

She had nothing else to tell him but that Lizzie Hexam's secret had
no reference whatever to the cruel charge, or its withdrawal. Oh yes
though! said Bella; she might as well mention one other thing; Lizzie
was very desirous to thank her unknown friend who had sent her the
written retractation. Was she, indeed? observed the Secretary. Ah! Bella
asked him, had he any notion who that unknown friend might be? He had no
notion whatever.

They were on the borders of Oxfordshire, so far had poor old Betty
Higden strayed. They were to return by the train presently, and, the
station being near at hand, the Reverend Fr