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"It's impossible," he exclaimed

"Impossible--?"

"How do you knohat you've just told me?"

"I saw Ellen yesterday--I told you I'd seen her at Granny's"

"It wasn't then that she told you?"

"No; I had a note from her this afternoon--Do you want to see it?"

He could not find his voice, and she went out of the rooht you knew," she said simply

She laid a sheet of paper on the table, and Archer put out his hand and took it up The letter contained only a few lines

"May dear, I have at last made Granny understand that my visit to her could be no enerous as ever She sees now that if I return to Europe I must live bywith ton to pack up, and we sail next week You ood as you've always been to e my mind, please tell them it would be utterly useless"

Archer read the letter over two or three ti

The sound of his laugh startled hiht hirae had been advanced

"Why did she write this?" he asked, checking his laugh with a supreme effort

May met the question with her unshaken candour "I suppose because we talked things over yesterday--"

"What things?"

"I told her I was afraid I hadn't been fair to her--hadn't always understood how hard itso ers; who felt the right to criticise, and yet didn't always know the circumstances" She paused "I knew you'd been the one friend she could always count on; and I wanted her to know that you and I were the sa for hi to tell her this I think she understands everything"

She went up to Archer, and taking one of his cold hands pressed it quickly against her cheek

"My head aches too; good-night, dear," she said, and turned to the door, her torn andafter her across the room