CHAPTER XXIX.
A BLESSING.
Miss Egerton took Arthur Noel--for it was he--straight back into her little sitting-room, and sitting down on her worn little horse-hair sofa, and raising her eyes anxiously to the young man's face, she told him the story of the attic upstairs, of the furniture she had purchased, of the girls she had meant to serve.

She showed him, with hands that trembled, the envelope with its queer inscription, and she unfolded for his benefit the empty sheet of blank paper.

She told her story at once without any reservation, even relating with a little hasty blush how she felt obliged to pay for the furniture herself.
Perhaps Arthur Noel was the only person in the world to whom she would have made this confession; for she was one of those who made it a practice never to let her right hand know what her left did, but she had known Arthur from his boyhood, and he was one of those men who inspire trust and sympathy at a glance.
He listened to the story with interest, and even excitement--he was naturally enthusiastic, but even Miss Egerton had never seen him so perturbed and so moved as he was at present.
"I know about those girls," he said at last; "what are their names ?--I am sure I know about them.

Nay, let me ask you a question--Is not one called Jasmine?
Has she not a piquant face, and very soft and yet bright eyes, and a great lot of curly brown hair?
Yes, Miss Egerton, I am sure the girls you speak of are in a certain sense _my_ girls; for if they are the ones I mean I took them under my protection long ago." "Their name is Mainwaring.

My dear Arthur, where and how have you met them?
My dear boy, I fully believe, I have always believed, in your good intentions, in your wish to do your utmost for every one; but if you have really known Primrose, and Jasmine and Daisy, and have taken them, as you say, under your protection, I must say that of late you have lost sight of them--you have not been as kind as you generally are to people in difficulties, for I never met three more absolutely friendless girls than these." "It was a good Providence sent me here this morning," said Noel.