"No--I hadn't heard--"
"Well, I don't know where you live all your time!" said Fanny, impatiently. "There's heaps of people at Dunscombe know that I've been engaged to Fred Birch for three months. I wasn't going to write to you, of course, because I--well!--I knew you thought I'd been rough on you--about that--you know."
"Fred Birch!" Diana's voice was faltering and amazed.
Fanny twisted her hat in her hands.
"He's all right," she said, angrily, "if his business hadn't been ruined by a lot of nasty crawling tale-tellers. If people'd only mind their own business! However, there it is--he's ruined--he hasn't got a penny piece--and, of course, he can't marry me, if--well, if somebody don't help us out."
Diana's face changed.
"Do you mean that I should help you out?"
"Well, there's no one else!" said Fanny, still, as it seemed, defying something or some one.
"I gave you--a thousand pounds."
"You gave it mother I I got precious little of it. I've had to borrow, lately, from people in the boarding-house. And I can't get any more--there! I'm just broke--stony."