“Are you sure of that?” said Justina.

“Quite sure; you invited yourself.”

“Did I make a mistake?  Well, if he did not at first intend it, he certainly caught at the notion afterwards.”

“Do you think so?  I thought, on the contrary, that he spent some moments in considering what day he could spare to come and receive us.”

“Perhaps it is just as well,” answered Justina; “I should have felt very awkward going about his house and garden in his absence.”

“Justina,” said Emily, driven at last to front the question, “how much do you wish me to understand?”

“Nothing at all, dear, but what you see,” she replied, without lifting her head from her work; then she added, “Do those children come here often?”

“Two or three times a week, I think,” answered Emily, with a degree of carelessness that attracted Miss Fairbairn’s attention.  She had appeared more than commonly indifferent that morning, she had hardly responded to the loving caresses of John’s children, but this had seemed to signify nothing, they came and hung about her just the same.

“They had taken those gardens some time before I found it out,” she continued.  “They run through the copses and through those three or four fields that belong to John, and get into my garden over the stepping-stones in the brook.”

“They must feel very sure of their welcome,” said Justina, rather pointedly.

“Yes,” answered Emily, also rather pointedly; “but I have never invited them to come, never once; there is, as you see, no occasion.”

Holding her graceful head a little higher than usual, she folded up her now finished shawl, ran up-stairs with it to Miss Christie’s room, and was conscious almost at once (or she fancied so) that her old aunt looked at her with a certain air of scrutiny, not unmixed with amusement.  She was relieved when she had put on her gift to hear Miss Christie say, “Well, ye’ll be glad to know that I feel more at my ease now than I’ve done for some time.”

There had been such an air of triumph in Miss Christie’s glance that Emily was pleased to find she was only exultant on account of her health.  She expressed her gladness, and assured the old lady she would soon be as active as ever.

“It’s no my foot I’m thinking of,” answered Miss Christie, “but some bad advice that weighed on my mind—­bad advice that I’ve given to John Mortimer.”  Thereupon she related the conversation in which she had recommended Miss Fairbairn to him.

Emily sat very still—­so still, that she hardly seemed to breathe, then, looking up, she said, perhaps rather more calmly and quietly than was her wont—­

“Several people have thought it would be a good thing for John to marry Justina Fairbairn.”

“And I was one of them,” quoth Miss Christie, her eyes sparkling with joy and malice, “but I’ve thought lately that I was just mistaken,” and she presently related what had passed between her and John that morning.