certainly shall not take money
from you if you believe such evil things of me. I have known nothing of
the acquaintance between my cousin and Miss Adair; but after what you
have said I will not accept anything at your hands."

"Then I am afraid it will have to remain on the table," said Lady
Caroline, as she swept out of the room, "for I cannot take it back
again."

Janetta caught up the envelope. One glance showed her that it contained
a cheque. She tore it across and across, and was in time to place the
fragments on the seat beside Lady Caroline, just before the carriage was
driven away. She went back into the house with raised head and flaming
cheeks, too angry and annoyed to settle down to work, too much hurt to
be anything but restless and preoccupied. The reaction did not set in
for some hours; but by six o'clock, when the children were all out of
doors and her stepmother had gone to visit a friend, and Janetta had
the house to herself, she lay down on a couch in the drawing-room with a
feeling of intense exhaustion and fatigue. She was too tired almost to
cry, but a tear welled up now and then, and was allowed to trickle
quietly down her pale cheek. She was utterly wretched and depressed: the
world seemed a dark place to her, especially when she considered that
she had already lost one friend whom she had so long and so tenderly
loved, and that she was not unlikely to lose another. For Wyvis might
blame her--_would_ blame her, probably--for what she had said to Lady
Caroline.

A knock at the front door aroused her. It was a knock that she did not
know; and she wondered at first whether one of the Adairs or one of the
Brands were coming to visit her. She sat up and hastily rearranged her
hair and dried her eyes. The charity orphan was within hearing and had
gone to the door: it was she who presently flung open the door and
announced, in awe-stricken tones--

"Sir Philip Hashley."

Janetta rose in some consternation. What did this visit portend? Had
_he_ also come to reproach her for her conduct to Margaret and Wyvis?
For she surmised--chiefly from the way in which she had seen him follow
Margaret with his eyes at the garden-party--that his old love was not
dead.

He greeted her with his usual gentleness of manner, and sat down--not
immediately facing her, as she was glad to think, scarcely realizing
that he had at once seen the trouble in her face, and did not wish to
embarrass her by a straightforward ga