She had just finished her letter, and was carefully folding it for its envelope, with the two whole five-pound notes imprudently placed within it, when she heard a footstep on the gravel path which led up from a small wicket to the front door.

The path ran near the drawing-room window, and she was just in time to catch a glimpse of the last fold of a passing cloak.

"It is Justinia," she said to herself; and her heart became disturbed at the idea of again discussing the morning's adventure.

"What am I to do," she had said to herself before, "if she wants me to beg her pardon?
I will not own before her that he is in the wrong." And then the door opened--for the visitor made her entrance without the aid of any servant--and Lady Lufton herself stood before her.
"Fanny," she said at once, "I have come to beg your pardon." "Oh, Lady Lufton!" "I was very much harassed when you came to me just now;--by more things than one, my dear.

But, nevertheless, I should not have spoken to you of your husband as I did, and so I have come to beg your pardon." Mrs.Robarts was past answering by the time that this was said, past answering at least in words; so she jumped up, and with her eyes full of tears, threw herself into her old friend's arms.
"Oh, Lady Lufton!" she sobbed forth again.
"You will forgive me, won't you ?" said her ladyship, as she returned her young friend's caress.