The front doorbell announced the arrival of another caller.

She went away, wondering, as he meant she should, whether he were so very undecided, after all.  Certainly his indecisions closed a subject more effectually than other people’s verdicts.

She found Anne in the empty, half-dark drawing-room waiting for her.  She had chosen the darkest corner, and the darkest hour.

“Fanny,” she said, and her voice trembled, “are you alone?  Can I speak to you a moment?”

“Yes, dear, yes.  Just let me leave word with Mason that I’m not at home.  But no one will come now.”

In the interval she heard Anne struggling with the sob that had choked her voice.  She felt that the decision had been made for her.  The terrible task had been taken out of her hands.  Anne knew.

She sat down beside her friend and put her hand on her shoulder.  In that moment poor Fanny’s intellectual vanities dropped from her, like an inappropriate garment, and she became pure woman.  She forgot Anne’s recent disaffection and her coldness, she forgot the years that had separated them, and remembered only the time when Anne was the girlfriend who had loved her, and had come to her in all her griefs, and had made her house her home.

“What is it, dear?” she murmured.

Anne felt for her hand and pressed it.  She tried to speak, but no words would come.

“Of course,” thought Mrs. Eliott, “she cannot tell me.  But she knows I know.”

“My dear,” she said, “can I or Johnson help you?”

Anne shook her head; but she pressed her friend’s hand tighter.

Wondering what she could do or say to help her, Mrs. Eliott resolved to take Anne’s knowledge for granted, and act upon it.

“If there’s trouble, dear, will you come to us?  We want you to look on our house as a refuge, any hour of the day or night.”

Anne stared at her friend.  There was something ominous and dismaying in her solemn tenderness, and it roused Anne to wonder, even in her grief.

“You cannot help me, dear,” she said.  “No one can.  Yet I had to come to you and tell you—­”

“Tell me everything,” said Mrs. Eliott, “if you can.”

Anne tried to steady her voice to tell her, and failed.  Then Fanny had an inspiration.  She felt that she must divert Anne’s thoughts from the grief that made her dumb, and get her to talk naturally of other things.

“How’s Peggy?” said she.  She knew it would be good to remind her that, whatever happened, she had still the child.

But at that question, Anne released Mrs. Eliott’s hand, and laid her head back upon the cushion and cried.

“Dear,” whispered Mrs. Eliott, with her inspiration full upon her, “you will always have her.”

Then Anne sat up in her corner, and put away her tears, and controlled herself to speak.

“Fanny,” she said, “Dr. Gardner has seen her.  He says I shall not have her very long.  Perhaps—­a few years—­if we take the very greatest care—­”