ned her footsteps as, in imagination, she saw herself in
the witness-box speaking on behalf of Lionel Varick.

She argued with herself that, after all, it was just possible that he
might be innocent! If so, she would fight for him to the death, and
that, however much it distressed and angered Mark Gifford that she
should do so.

Absorbed in the dread and terrible thing he had come to tell her, she
had not given him, the man who loved her, and whose wife she was to be,
one thought since their solemn, rather shamefaced, embrace. Yet now the
knowledge that, however, much he disapproved, Mark would stand by her,
gave her a wonderful feeling of security, of having left the open sea of
life for a safe harbour--and that in spite of the terrible hours,
perhaps the terrible weeks and months, which now lay before her.

* * * * *

Turning the sharp angle which led to the gate giving admittance to the
gardens of Wyndfell Hall, she suddenly met Helen Brabazon face to face,
and for one wild moment Blanche thought that Helen _knew_. The girl's
usually placid, comely face was disfigured. It was plain that she had
been crying bitterly.

"I'm going to the village," she exclaimed; "I've got to go home to-day,
and I must telegraph to my uncle."

"I hope you haven't had bad news?" said Blanche mechanically.

She was telling herself that it was quite, quite impossible that Helen
knew anything--but as Helen, who had begun crying again, shook her head,
Blanche asked: "Does Lionel know that you want to leave to-day?"

"Yes; I have told Mr. Varick," and then all at once she exclaimed: "Oh,
Miss Farrow, I feel so utterly miserable! Mr. Varick has just asked me
to be his wife, and it has made me feel as if I had been so treacherous
to Milly. Yet I don't think I did anything to make him like me? Do you
think I did?"

She looked appealingly at Blanche.

It was plain that what had happened had given her an extraordinary
shock. "I am sure, now," she went on falteringly, "that Milly--poor,
poor Milly--haunts this house. I have felt, again and again, as if she
were hovering about me. I believe that what I saw in the hall, on that
awful afternoon, was really _her_. Yet Mr. Varick says that Milly would
be very pleased if he and I were to marry each other. Surely he is
mistaken?"

"Yes," said Blanche slowly, "I think he is."

"I feel so miserable," went on the girl, still speaking with a touch of
excitement whi