'I did tell her so, 'm, but she would not take "No"; she says if she stays all night she must see you.' 'What does she mean?' cries Peggy, in a voice of astonished indignation; 'who can she be? Who is she?' 'Well, 'm, I really did not recognise her until she spoke--dressed in deep mourning and that; and she asked me not to mention her name. She said she was sure you would not see her if I did.' _Dressed in deep mourning!_ Peggy's legs have been somewhat shaky under her of late, through long standing upon them. Perhaps that is why she now catches at the banisters. It has flashed upon her who her visitor is. What has brought her hither? Why has she come? Has she gone mad? 'Go and sit with Miss Prue, while I am away,' she says to the servant; and so walks slowly downstairs. Outside the door of the hall she pauses a moment to pull herself together. She is trembling violently, and her teeth chatter. What has brought her here? What can they have to say to each other? She enters. Beside the table is standing Lady Betty Harborough; for it is she who is Peggy's visitor. The lamp is lit, and burns brightly, though nowadays there is never any one to read or work by its gentle glow. A flourishing fire sings on the hearth; but their joint cheerfulness serves only to throw up into higher relief the inky gloom of the figure they illuminate. She makes no movement to go to meet Peggy, but awaits her coming; and for a moment the two women look at each other in silence. As they do so, a doubt--a real, serious doubt flashes across Peggy's mind, as to whether this is Lady Betty. Coupled with the doubt comes a darted recollection of the two last occasions on which she has seen her; the very last of all, sitting under a date-palm in the Hartleys' conservatory, in the full flush of her _décolleté_ beauty and impudent folly, out of sheer love of mischief, turning the head of a foolish parish priest; and the time before--oh! that time before--when her own heart had lain down and died, on that star-strewn night, when through the gate of the walled garden she had seen her with her arms laced about John Talbot's neck.