"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.