s best left to--to the persons concerned."

Justine hesitated. "I might answer that, if you take that view, it was
inconsistent of you to talk with me so openly. You've certainly made me
feel that you wanted help--you've turned to me for it. But perhaps that
does not justify my writing to Mr. Amherst without your knowing it."

Bessy laughed. "Ah, my dear, you knew that if you asked me the letter
would never be sent!"

"Perhaps I did," said Justine simply. "I was trying to help you against
your will."

"Well, you see the result." Bessy laid a derisive touch on the letter.
"Do you understand now whose fault it is if I am alone?"

Justine faced her steadily. "There is nothing in Mr. Amherst's letter to
make me change my opinion. I still think it lies with you to bring him
back."

Bessy raised a glittering face to her--all hardness and laughter. "Such
modesty, my dear! As if I had a chance of succeeding where you failed!"

She sprang up, brushing the curls from her temples with a petulant
gesture. "Don't mind me if I'm cross--but I've had a dose of preaching
from Maria Ansell, and I don't know why my friends should treat me like
a puppet without any preferences of my own, and press me upon a man who
has done his best to show that he doesn't want me. As a matter of fact,
he and I are luckily agreed on that point too--and I'm afraid all the
good advice in the world won't persuade us to change our opinion!"

Justine held her ground. "If I believed that of either of you, I
shouldn't have written--I should not be pleading with you now--And Mr.
Amherst doesn't believe it either," she added, after a pause, conscious
of the risk she was taking, but thinking the words might act like a blow
in the face of a person sinking under a deadly narcotic.

Bessy's smile deepened to a sneer. "I see you've talked me over
thoroughly--and on _his_ views I ought perhaps not to have risked an
opinion----"

"We have not talked you over," Justine exclaimed. "Mr. Amherst could
never talk of you...in the way you think...." And under the light
staccato of Bessy's laugh she found resolution to add: "It is not in
that way that I know what he feels."

"Ah? I should be curious to hear, then----"

Justine turned to the letter, which still lay between them. "Will you
read the last sentence again? The postscript, I mean."

Bessy, after a surprised glance at her, took the letter up with the
deprecating murmur of one who acts under compulsion rath