to see her once or twice
during the past year, and it had been understood between them, that
if Miss Mackenzie ever wanted a room for a night or two in London,
she could be accommodated at the old house. She would have preferred
to write to Hannah Protheroe,--or Mrs Protheroe, as she was now
called by brevet rank since she had held a house of her own,--had
time permitted her to do so. But time and the circumstances did not
permit this, and therefore she had herself driven to Arundel Street
without any notice.

Mrs Protheroe received her with open arms, and with many promises
of comfort and attendance,--as was to be expected, seeing that Mrs
Protheroe was, as she thought, receiving into her house the rich
heiress. She proffered at once the use of her drawing-room and of the
best bedroom, and declared that as the house was now empty, with the
exception of one young gentleman from Somerset House upstairs, she
would be able to devote herself almost exclusively to Miss Mackenzie.
Things were much changed from those former days in which Hannah
Protheroe used frequently to snub Margaret Mackenzie, being almost of
equal standing in the house with her young mistress. And now Margaret
was called upon to explain, that low as her standing might have been
then, at this present moment it was even lower. She had indeed the
means of paying for her lodgings, but these she was called upon to
husband with the minutest economy. The task of telling all this was
difficult. She began it by declining the drawing-room, and by saying
that a bedroom upstairs would suffice for her.

"You haven't heard, Hannah, what has happened to me," she said, when
Mrs Protheroe expressed her surprise at this decision. "My brother's
will was no will at all. I do not get any of his property. It all
goes under some other will to my cousin, Mr John Ball."

By these tidings Hannah was of course prostrated, and driven into a
state of excitement that was not without its pleasantness as far as
she was concerned. Of course she objected that the last will must be
the real will, and in this way the matter came to full discussion
between them.

"And, after all, that John Ball is to have everything!" said Mrs
Protheroe, holding up both her hands. By this time Hannah Protheroe
had got herself comfortably into a chair, and no doubt her personal
pleasure in the evening's occupation was considerably enhanced by the
unconscious feeling that she was the richer woman of the