"I don't know what it means by being on the foundation, but I don't think I am poor. I think, on the contrary, that I am very rich. Did you ever hear of a girl who lived in a castle—a great beautiful castle—on the top of a high hill? If you ever did, I am that girl."
"Oh, my!" said Susy Hopkins. "That does sound romantic."
Her momentary dislike to Kathleen had vanished. The desire to go to the town on a message for her mother had completely left her. She stood still, as though fascinated.
"I live there," said Kathleen—"that is, I do when I am at home. I come from the land of the mountain and the stream; of the shamrock; of the deep, deep blue sea."
"Ireland? Are you Irish?" said the girl.
"I am proud to say that I am."
"We don't think anything of the Irish here."
"Oh, don't you?"
"But don't be angry, please," continued Susy, "for I am sure you are very nice."
"I am nice when I like. To-day I am nasty. I am wicked to-day—quite wicked; I could hate any one who opposes me. I want some one to help me; if some one will help me, I will be nice to that person. Will you?"
"Oh, my word, yes! How handsome you look when you flash your eyes!" said Susy Hopkins.
"Then I want to find that dear little girl, who is so beautiful that I love her and can't get her out of my head. I want to find Ruth Craven. She went away with a horrid, stiff, pokery girl called Cassandra Weldon. You have such strange names in your country. That horrid, prim Cassandra chose to correct me when I came into school, and she has taken my darling away—the only one I love in the whole of England. I want to find her. I will give you—- I will give you an Irish diamond set in a brooch if you will help me."
This sounded a very grand offer indeed to Susy Hopkins, who lived in the most modest way, and had not a jewel of any sort in her possession.
"I will help you. I will, and I can. I know where Miss Weldon lives. I can take you to her house."
"But I want Ruth."
"If she has taken Ruth home, she will be at Cassandra's house," said Susy.
"And you can take me there?"
"This blessed minute."
"All right; come along."
"When will you give me the diamond set in the brooch?"
"It isn't a real diamond, you know. It is an Irish diamond set in silver—real silver. My old nurse had it made for me, and I wear it sometimes. I will bring it to you to school to-morrow."
"Oh, thank you—thank you, Miss—I forgot your name."
"O'Hara—Kathleen O'Hara."
"O'Hara is rather a difficult name to say. May I call you Kathleen?"
"Just as you please, Susan. It is more handy for me to say Susan than Hopkins. As long as I am in England I must consort, I see, with all kinds of people; and if you will make yourself useful to me, I will be good to you."
Susy turned and led the way in the direction of Cassandra Weldon's home. They had to walk across a very wide field, then down a narrow lane, then up a steep hill, and then into a valley. At the bottom of the valley was a straight road, and at each side of the road were neat little houses—small and very proper-looking. Each house consisted of two stories, with a hall door in the middle and a sitting room on each side. There were three windows overhead, and one or two attics in the roof. The houses were very compact; they were new, and were called by ambitious names. For instance, the house where the Weldons lived went by the ambitious name of Sans Souci. All through the walk Susy chatted for the benefit of her companion. She told Kathleen so much about her life that she was interested in spite of herself! and by the time they arrived outside Sans Souci, Kathleen's hand was lying affectionately on her companion's arm.
"I had best not go in, miss," she said. "Cassandra Weldon would never take the very least notice of me; and none of us foundation girls like her at all."
"Well, it is extremely unfair," said Kathleen. "From all you have been telling me, the foundation girls must be particularly clever. I tell you what it is: I think I shall take to you."
"Oh, would you, indeed, miss?" said Susy, her eyes sparkling. "There are a hundred of us, you know, in the school."
"That is a great number. And Ruth Craven is really one?"
"She is, miss. She isn't a bit better than the rest of us."
"And I love her already."
"She is no better than the rest of us," repeated Susan Hopkins.
"I have a great mind to take to you all, to make a fuss about you, and to show the others how badly they behave."
"You'd be a queen amongst us; there's no doubt about that."
"It would be lovely, and it would be a tremendous bit of naughtiness," thought Kathleen.
"Do you think you will, miss? Because, if you do, I will tell the others. We could meet you and talk over things."
"Well, I will decide to-morrow. I will enclose a letter with your brooch. Good-bye now; I must go in and kiss my darling Ruth."
Susy Hopkins stood for a minute to watch Kathleen as she went up the little narrow path of Sans Souci. When Kathleen reached the porch she waved her hand, and Susy, putting wings to her feet, ran as fast as she could in the opposite direction. She felt very much elated and really pleased. In the whole course of her life she had never met a girl of the Kathleen O'Hara type before. Her beauty, her daring and wild manner, the flash in her bright dark eyes, the glints of gold in her lovely hair, all fascinated Susy.
"What a queen she'd make!" she thought. "We must make her our queen. We'd have quite a party of our own in the school if she took us up. And she will; I'm sure she will. This is a lark. This is worth a great deal."
Meanwhile Kathleen rang the bell at Sans Souci in a very smart, imperative manner. A little maid, neatly dressed, came to the door.
"Please," said Kathleen, "will you say that Miss O'Hara has called and would be glad to see Miss Ruth Craven for a few minutes?"
The girl withdrew. Presently she returned.
"Mrs. Weldon will be pleased if you will go in, miss. She is sitting in the drawing-room. The two young ladies are out in the garden."
"Thank you," said Kathleen.
After a brief hesitation she entered the house, and was conducted across the narrow hall into a very sweet and charmingly furnished room. The room had a bay-window with French doors; these opened on to a little flower-lawn. At one side of the house was a tiny conservatory full of bright flowers. Compared to the house where the Tennants lived, this tiny place looked like a paradise to Kathleen. She gave a quick glance round her, then came up to Mrs. Weldon.
"I am one of the new girls at the Great Shirley School," she said. "My name is Kathleen O'Hara. I am Irish. I have only just crossed the cold sea. I am lonely, too. I want Ruth Craven. May I sit down a minute while your servant fetches her? I like Ruth Craven. She is very pretty, isn't she? She is the sort of girl that you'd take a fancy to when you're lonely and far from home. May I sit here until she comes?"
"Of course, my dear," said Mrs. Weldon, speaking with kindness, and looking with eyes full of interest at the handsome, striking-looking girl. "I quite understand your being lonely. I was very lonely indeed when I came home from India and left my dear father and mother behind me."
"How old were you when you came home?"
"A great deal younger than you are: only seven years old. But that is a long time ago. I should like to be kind to you, Miss O'Hara. Cassandra has been telling me about you. You are living at the Tennants', are you not? Alice Tennant and Cassandra are great friends."
"But I don't like either of them," said Kathleen in her blunt way.
Mrs. Weldon looked a little startled.
"Do you know my daughter?" she asked.
"She is much too interfering, and she is frightfully stuck-up. Please forgive me, but I am always very plain-spoken; I always tell the truth. I don't want her. I like you, and wish that I lived with you, and that you'd have Ruth Craven instead of your own daughter in the house. Then I'd be perfectly happy. I always did say what I thought. Will you forgive me?"
"I will, dear, because at the present moment you don't know my girl at all. There never was a more splendid girl in all the world, but she requires to be known. Ah! here she comes, and your little friend, Miss Craven, with her."
Ruth, looking very pretty, with a delicate flush on each cheek, now entered the room in the company of Cassandra. Kathleen sprang up the minute she saw Ruth, rushed across the room, and flung one arm with considerable violence round her neck.
"You have come," she said. "I have been hunting the place for you. How dared you go away and hide yourself? Don't you know that you belong to me? The moment I saw you I knew that you were my affinity. Don't you know what an affinity means? Well, you are mine. We were twin souls before birth; now we have met again and we cannot part. I am ever so happy when I am with you. Don't mind those others; let them stare all they like. I am going to take you foundation girls up. I have made up my mind. We will have a rollicking good time—a splendid time. We will be as naughty as we like, and we will let the others see what we are made of. It will be war to the knife between the foundation girls and the good, proper, paying girls. Let the ladies look after themselves. We of the foundation will lead our own life, and be as happy as the day is long. Aren't you glad to see me, dear, sweet, pretty Ruth? Don't you know for yourself that you are my affinity—my chosen friend, my beloved? Through the ages we have been one, and now we have met in the flesh."
"I think," said Cassandra, at last managing to get herself heard, "that you have said enough for the present, Miss O'Hara. Ruth Craven has come to spend the day with me. I know that you are an Irish girl, and you must be lonely. I shall be very pleased if you will join Ruth and me in our walk. We are going for a walk across the common.—We shall be in to tea, dear mother. Will you have it ready for us not later than five o'clock? And I am sure you will join me, mother darling, in asking Miss O'Hara to stay, too."
"But Miss O'Hara doesn't want to join either you or your 'mother darling,'" said Kathleen in her rudest tone. "It is Ruth I want. I have come here for her. She must return with me at once."
"But I can't. I am ever so sorry, Miss O'Hara."
"You mean that you won't come when I have called for you?"
"I am with Miss Weldon at present."
"Be sensible, dear," said Mrs. Weldon at that moment. "You don't quite understand our manners in this country. However attached we may be to a person, we don't enter a strange house and snatch that person out of it. It isn't our way; and I don't think—you will forgive me for saying it—that your way is as nice as ours. Be persuaded, dear, and join Cassandra and Ruth, and have a happy time."
Kathleen's face had turned crimson. She looked from Mrs. Weldon to Cassandra, and then she looked at Ruth. Suddenly her eyes brimmed up with tears.
"I don't think I can ever change my way," she said. "I am sorry if I am rude and not understood. Perhaps, after all, I am mistaken, about Ruth; perhaps she is not my real proper affinity. I am a very unhappy girl. I wish I could go back to mother and to my dad. I shouldn't be lonely if I were in the midst of the mountains, and if I could see the streams and the blue sea. I don't know why Aunt Katie O'Flynn sent me to this horrid place. I wish I was back in the old country. They don't talk as you talk in the old country and they don't look as you look. If you put your heart at the feet of a body in old Ireland, that body doesn't kick it away. I will go. I don't want your tea. I don't want anything that you have to offer me. I don't like any of you. I am sorry if you think me rude, but I can't help myself. Good-bye."
"No, no; stay. Stay and visit with me, and tell me about the old country and the sea and the mountains," said Mrs. Weldon.
But Kathleen shook her head fiercely, and the next moment left the room.
"Poor, strange little girl," thought the good woman. "I see she is about to heap unhappiness on herself and others. What is to be done for her?"
"I like her," said Ruth. "She is very impulsive, but she is———"
"Oh, yes," said Cassandra, "she has a good heart, of course; but I foresee that she is up to all sorts of mischief. She doesn't understand our ways. Why did she leave her own country?"
Ruth was silent. She looked wistful.
"Come along, Ruthie; we will be late. I have no end of schemes in my head. I mean to help you. You will win that scholarship."
Ruth smiled. Presently she and Cassandra were crossing the common arm-in-arm. In the interest of their own conversation they forgot Kathleen.
When that young lady left the house she ran back to the Tennants'.
"I will write to dad to-night and tell him that I can't stay," she thought. "Oh, dear, my heart is in my mouth! I shall have a broken heart if this sort of thing goes on."
She entered the house. There sat Mrs. Tennant with a great basket of stockings before her. The remains of a rough-looking tea were on the table. The boys had disappeared.
"Come in, Kathleen," called Mrs. Tennant, "and have your tea. I want Maria to clear the tea-things away, as I have some cutting out to do; so be quick, dear."
Kathleen entered. The untidy table did not trouble her in the least; she was accustomed to things of that sort at home. She sat down, helped herself to a thick slice of bread-and-butter, and ate it, while burning thoughts filled her mind.
"Have some tea. You haven't touched any," said Mrs. Tennant.
"I'd rather have cold water, please," Kathleen replied.
She went to the sideboard, filled a glass, and drank it off.
"Mrs. Tennant," she said when she had finished, "what possessed you to live in England? You had all the world to choose from. Why did you come to a horrible place like this?"
"But I like it," said Mrs. Tennant.
"You don't look as if you did. I never saw such a worn-out poor body. Are you awfully old?"
"You would think me so," replied Mrs. Tennant, with a smile; "but as a matter of fact I am not forty yet."
"Not forty!" said Kathleen. "But forty's an awful age, isn't it? I mean, you want crutches when you are forty, don't you?"
"Not as a rule, my dear. I trust when I am forty I shall not want a crutch. I shall be forty in two years, and that by some people is considered young."
"Then I suppose it is mending those horrid stockings that makes you so old."
"Mending stockings doesn't help to keep you young, certainly."
"Shall I help you? I used to cobble for old nurse when I was at home."
"But I shouldn't like you to cobble these."
"Oh, I can darn, you know."
"Then do, Kathleen. I should take it very kindly if you would. Here is worsted, and here is a needle. Will you sit by me and tell me about your home?"
Kathleen certainly would not have believed her own ears had she been told an hour ago that she would end her first fit of desperate naughtiness by darning stockings for the Tennant boys. She did not darn well; but then, Mrs. Tennant was not particular. She certainly—although she said she would not—did cobble these stockings to an extraordinary extent; but her work and the chat with Mrs. Tennant did her good, and she went upstairs to dress for supper in a happier frame of mind.
"I will stay here for a little," she said finally to Mrs. Tennant, "because I think it will help you. You look so terribly tired; and I don't think you ought to have this horrible work to do. I'd like to do it for you, but I don't suppose I shall have time. I will stay for a bit and see what I can make of the foundation girls."
"The foundation girls?"
"Oh, yes; don't ask me to explain. There are a hundred of them at the Great Shirley School, and I am going—No, I can't explain. I will stop here instead of running away. I meant to run away when my affinity would have nothing to do with me."
"Really, Kathleen, you are a most extraordinary girl."
"Of course I am," said Kathleen. "Did you ever suppose that I was anything else? I am very remarkable, and I am very naughty. I always was, and I always will be. I am up to no end of mischief. I wish you could have seen me and Rory together at home. Oh, what didn't we do? Do you know that once we walked across a little bridge of metal which is put between two of the stables? It is just a narrow iron rod, six feet in length. If we had either of us fallen we'd have been dashed to pieces on the cobble-stones forty feet below. Mother saw me when I was half-way across, and she gave a shriek. It nearly finished me, but I steadied myself and got across. Oh, it was jolly! I am going to set some of the foundation girls at that sort of thing. I expect I shall have great fun with them. It is principally because my affinity won't have anything to do with me; she is attaching herself to another, and that other is little better than a monster. Your Alice won't like me; and, to be frank with you, I don't like her. I like you, because you are poor and worried and seem old for your age—although your age is a great one—and because you have to cobble those horrid socks. There! good-bye for the present. Don't hate me too much; I can't help the way I am made. Oh; I hear Alice. What a detestable voice she has! Now then, I'm off."
Kathleen ran up to her room, and again she locked the door. She heard Alice's step, and she felt a certain vindictiveness as she turned the key in the lock. Alice presently took the handle of the door and shook it.
"Let me in at once, Kathleen," she said. "I really can't put up with this sort of thing any longer. I want to get into my room; I want to tidy myself. I am going to supper to-night with Cassandra Weldon."
"Then you don't get in," whispered Kathleen to herself. Aloud she said:
"I am sorry, darling, but I am specially busy, and I really must have my share of the room to myself."
"Do open the door, Kathleen," now almost pleaded poor Alice. "If you want your share of the room, I want mine. Don't you understand?"
"I am not interfering, dearest," called back Kathleen, "and I am keeping religiously to my own half. I have the straight window, and you have the bay. I am not touching your beautiful half; I am only in mine."
"Let me in," called Alice again, "and don't be silly."
"Sorry, dear; don't think I am silly."
There was a silence. Alice went on her knees and peered through the keyhole: Kathleen was seated by her dressing-table, and there was a sound of the furious scratching of a pen quite audible. "This is intolerable," thought Alice. "She is the most awful girl I ever heard of. I shall be late. Mary Addersley and Rhoda Pierpont are to call for me shortly, and I shan't be ready. I don't want to appeal to mother or to be rude to the poor wild thing the first day. Stay, I will tempt her.—Kathleen!"
"Yes, darling."
"Wouldn't you like to come with me to Cassandra Weldon's? She is so nice, and so is her mother. She plays beautifully, and they will sing."
"Irish songs?" called out Kathleen.
"I don't know. Perhaps they will if you ask them."
"Thanks," replied Kathleen; "I am not going." Again there was silence, and the scratching of the pen continued. Alice was now obliged to go downstairs to acquaint her mother.
"What is it, dear? Why, my dear Alice, how excited you look!"
"I have cause to be, mother. I have come in rather late, very much fagged out from a day of hard examination work and that imp—that horrid girl—has locked me out of my bedroom. I was so looking forward to a nice little supper with Cassandra and the other girls! Kathleen won't let me in; she really is intolerable. I can't stay in the room with her any longer; she is past bearing. Can't you give me an attic to myself at the top of the house?"
"You know I haven't a corner."
"Can't I share your bed, mummy? I shall be so miserable with that dreadful Kathleen."
"You know quite well, Alice, that that is the only really good bedroom in the house, and I can't afford to give it to one girl by herself. I think Kathleen will be all right when we really get to know her; but she is very undisciplined. Still, three guineas a week makes an immense difference to me, Alice. I can't help telling you so, my child."
"In my opinion, it is hardly earned," said Alice. "I suppose I must stay down here and give up my supper. I can't go like this, all untidy, and my hair so messy, and my collar—oh, mother, it is nearly black! It is really too trying."
"I will go up and see if I can persuade her," said Mrs. Tennant.
She went upstairs, turned the handle of the door, and spoke. The moment her voice penetrated to Kathleen's ears, she jumped to her feet, crossed the room, and bent down at the other side of the keyhole.
"Don't tire your dear voice," she said. "What is it you want?"
"I want you to open the door, Kathleen. Poor Alice wants to get in to get her clothes. It is her room as much as yours. Let her in at once, my dear."
"I am very sorry, darling Mrs. Tennant, but I am privately engaged in my own half of the room. I am not interfering with Alice's."
"But you see, Kathleen, she can't get to her half."
"The door is in my half, you know," said Kathleen very meekly, "so I don't see that she has any cause to complain. I am awfully sorry; I will be as quick as I can."
"You annoy me very much. You make me very uncomfortable by going on in this extremely silly way, Kathleen."
"I will darn some more socks for you, darling, tired pet," whispered Kathleen coaxingly. "I really am awfully sorry, but there is no help for it. I must finish my own private affairs in my own half of the room."
She retreated from the door, and the scratching of the pen continued.
Alice downstairs felt like a caged lion. Mrs. Tennant admitted that Kathleen's conduct was very bad.
"It won't happen again, Alice," she said, "for I shall remove the key from the lock. She won't shut you out another time. Make the best of it, darling. If we don't worry her too much she is sure to capitulate."
"Not she. She is a perfect horror," said Alice.
Mrs. Weldon's supper party was to begin at eight o'clock. It was now seven, and the girls were to call for Alice at half-past. If Kathleen would only be quick she might still have time.
The boys came in. They stared open-eyed at Alice when they saw her still sitting in her rough school things, a very cross expression on her face. David came up to her at once; he was the favorite, and people said he had a way with him. Whatever they meant by that, most people did what David Tennant liked. He stood in front of his sister now and said:
"What's the matter? And where's the little Irish beauty?"
"For goodness' sake don't speak about her," said Alice. "She's driving me nearly mad."
"Your sister is naturally much annoyed, David," said his mother. "Kathleen is evidently a very tiresome girl. She has locked the door of their mutual bedroom, and declines to open it; she says that as the door happens to be in her half of the room, she has perfect control over it."
David whistled. Ben burst out laughing.
"Well, now that is Irish," David said.
"If you take her part I shall hate you all the rest of my life," said Alice, speaking with great passion.
"But can't you wait just for once?" asked David. "Any one could tell she is just trying it on. She'll get tired of sitting there by herself if only you have patience."
"But I am due at Cassandra's for supper" and Mary Addersley and Rhoda Pierpont are to call for me at half-past seven."
"Oh, that's it, is it?" said David.—"Ben, leave off teasing." For Ben was whistling and jumping about, and making the most expressive faces at poor Alice,—"I will see what I can do," he said, and he ran upstairs. David was very musical; indeed, the soul of music dwelt in his eyes, in his voice, in his very step. He might in some respects have been an Irish boy himself. He bent down now and whistled very softly, and in the most flute-like manner, "Garry Owen" through the keyhole. There was a restless sound in the room, and then a cross voice said:
"Go away."
David stopped whistling "Garry Owen," and proceeded to execute a most exquisite performance of "St. Patrick's Day in the Morning." Kathleen trembled. Her eyes filled with tears. David was now whistling right into her room "The Wearing of the Green." Kathleen flung down her pen, making a splash on the paper.
"Go away," she called out. "What are you doing there?"
"The outside of this door doesn't belong to you," called David, "and if I like to whistle through the keyhole you can't prevent me;" and he began "Garry Owen" again.
Kathleen rushed to the door and flung it open. The tears were still wet on her cheeks.
"Can't you guess what you are doing?" she said. "You are stabbing me—stabbing me. Oh! oh! oh!" and she burst into violent sobs. David took her hand.
"Come, little Irish colleen," he said. "Come along downstairs. I am going to be chummy with you. Don't be so lonely. Give Alice her room; one-half of it is hers, and she wants to dress to go out."
"Let her take it all," sobbed Kathleen. "I am most miserable. Oh, Garry Owen, Garry Owen! Oh, Land of the Shamrock! Oh, my broken heart!"
She laid her head on David's shoulder and went on sobbing. David felt quite bashful. There was nothing for it but to take out his big and not too clean handkerchief and wipe her tears away.
"Whisper," he said in her ear. "There are stables at the back of the house; they are old, worn-out stables. There is a loft over one, and I keep apples and nuts there. It's the jolliest place. Will you and I go there for an hour or two after supper?"
"Do you mean it?" said Kathleen, her eyes filling with laughter, and the tears still wet on her cheeks.
"Yes, colleen, I mean it, for I want you to tell me all you can about your land of the shamrock."
"Why, then, that I will," she replied. "Wisha, then, David, it's a broth of a boy, you are!" and she kissed him on his forehead. David took her hand and led her into the dining-room. Alice was still there, looking more stormy than ever.
"It's too late now," she said; "the girls have come and gone. I can't go at all now."
"But why, darling?" said Kathleen. "Oh! I wish I had let you in.—She must go, David, the poor dear. It would be cruel to disappoint her.—What dress will you wear?" said Kathleen.
"Let me alone," said Alice.
She rushed upstairs, but Kathleen was even quicker.
"I'm not going to be nasty to you any more," she said. "I have found a friend, and I shall have more friends tomorrow. Kathleen O'Hara would have died long ago but for her friends. I shall be happy when I have got a creelful of them here. Now then, let me help you. No, that isn't the shoe you want; here it is. And gloves—here's a pair, and they're neatly mended. Which hat did you say—the one with the blue scarf round it? Isn't it a pretty one? You put that on. Aunt Katie O'Flynn is going to send me a box of clothes from Dublin, and I will give you some of them. You mustn't say no; I will give you some if you are nice. I am ever so sorry that I kept you out of your part of the room; I won't do it any more. Now you are dressed; that's fine. You won't hate me forever, will you?"
Alice growled something in reply. She had not Kathleen's passionate, quick, impulsive nature—furious with rage one minute, sweet and gentle and affectionate the next. She hated Kathleen for having humiliated and annoyed her; and she went off to Cassandra's house knowing that she would be late, and determined not to say one good word for Kathleen.
CHAPTER V.
WIT AND GENIUS: THE PLAN PROPOUNDED.
While Kathleen was locked in Alice's room, she was writing to her father:
"My Darling Daddy.—If ever there was a cold, dreary, abominable land, it is this where they wave the British flag. The ugliness of it would make you sick. The people are as ugly as the country, and they're so stiff and stuck-up. If you suppose for a moment that your wild Irish girl can stand much of this sort of thing, you are fine and mistaken, and you can tell the mother so. I mean to write to Aunt Katie O'Flynn to-morrow and give her a fine piece of my mind. Early in the day, dad, I did not think that I could stay at all; but I have got a plan in my head now, and if I succeed I may at least put up with one term of this detestable school. I won't tell you the plan, for you mightn't approve; in fact, I can guess in advance that you wouldn't approve. Anyhow, it is going to occupy the time and thoughts of your Kathleen. Now I want a good bit of money; not a pound or even five pounds, but more than that. Can you send me a ten-pound note, daddy mine, and say nothing whatever about it to the mother or the retainers at Carrigrohane? And can you let me have it as quick as quick can be? Maybe I will want more before the term is up, or maybe I won't. Anyhow, we will let that lie in the future. Oh, my broth of an old dad, wouldn't I like to hug you this blessed minute? How is everybody at home? How are the mountains? How is the sea? How is the trout-stream? Are those young cousins of mine behaving themselves, the spalpeens? And how are you, my heart of hearts—missing your Kathleen, I doubt not? Well, no more for the present. They're rattling at the door like anything, and there's a detestable boy now whistling 'Garry Owen' right into my heart. You can't imagine what I am feeling. Oh, the omadhaun! he is changing it now into 'St. Patrick's Day,' Wisha, then, daddy! I must stop, for it's more than the heart of woman can stand. Your affectionate daughter,
"Kathleen."
This letter was posted by Kathleen herself. After supper she went with David into the old loft over the tumble-down stables. It was not a very safe place of refuge, for the rafters were rotten and might tumble down at any time. Still, the sense of danger made it all, the more interesting to the children. There they sat side by side, and Kathleen told David about her old life. She was very outspoken and affectionate, and very fierce and very wild. To look at her, one would have said there never was any one less reserved; but Kathleen in her heart of hearts was intensely reserved. Her real feelings she never told; her real hopes she never breathed. She talked with high spirits all the time; and although she liked David and was much comforted by his words and his actions, he did not get at the real Kathleen at all.
When Alice came back that evening Kathleen was sound asleep in her little bed, dreaming of Carrigrohane and the old home. She was murmuring some loving words as Alice entered the room.
"Oh, daddy mine, my heart is sore for you," she was saying in a tone which caused Alice to pause and look at her attentively.
"She is the most awful girl I ever heard of," thought Alice. "I am sure she will get us into trouble. I know that those three guineas a week that mother gets for having her are not worth all the mischief she will drag us into. But still, she does look pretty when she is asleep."
Kathleen had very long and very thick eyelashes and nobly arched brows. Her forehead was broad and full and beautifully white. The mischievous, dare-devil expression of her face when awake was softened in her sleep. Alice, who had determined to come very noisily into the room and bang her things about, to take rude possession of her own half of the room—which, after all, was the better half—was softened by the look on the girl's face. She knelt for a moment at her bedside and prayed that God would keep her from quite hating Kathleen. This was a great deal from Alice, who had made up her mind never to be friends with the Irish girl. Then she got into bed and fell asleep.
The next morning, quite early, Kathleen was up. She was accustomed to getting up almost at cock-crow at Carrigrohane, and when Alice opened her eyes, it was to see an empty bed and an empty room.
"I wonder if she's up to mischief?" she thought.
She got up and went to the window. Kathleen was walking across the common. She had no hat on, and no jacket. She was stepping along leisurely, looking up sometimes at the sky, and sometimes pausing as though she was thinking hard.
"She will catch cold and be ill; that will be the next trouble," thought the indignant Alice. She sleepily proceeded with her dressing. It was only half-past seven. The Great Shirley School met at nine. Alice was seldom downstairs until past eight. When she came down this morning she saw, to her amazement, Kathleen helping the very untidy maid-of-all-work to lay the breakfast things. She was dashing about, putting plates and cups and saucers anyhow upon the board.
"Now then, Maria," she said, "shall I run down to the kitchen and bring up the hot bacon and the porridge? I will, with a heart and a half. Oh, you poor girl, how tired you look!"
Maria, whom Alice never noticed, looked with adoring eyes at beautiful Kathleen.
"It isn't right, miss. I ought to be doing my own work," she said. "I am ever so much obliged to you, miss."
"Wisha, then, it is I who like to help you," said Kathleen, "for you look fair beat."
She dashed past Alice, and appeared the next moment in the kitchen.
"Where's the bacon, cook? And where's the bread, and where's the butter, and all the rest of the breakfast? See, woman—see! Give me a tray and I will fill it up and take the things upstairs with my own hands. You think it is beneath me, perhaps; but I am a lady from a castle, and at Carrigrohane Castle we often do this sort of thing when the hands of the poor maids are full to overflowing."
The cook, a sandy-haired and sour-looking woman, began by scowling at Kathleen; but soon the girl's pretty face and merry eyes appeased her. She and Kathleen had almost a quarrel as to who was to carry up the tray, but Kathleen won the day; and when Mrs. Tennant made her appearance, feeling tired and overdone, she was amazed to see Kathleen acting parlor-maid.
"I love it," she said. "If I can help you, you dear, tired, worn one, I shall be only too glad."
"I am sure, mother," said Alice, "it is very good of Kathleen to wish to do the household work; but as she has been sent here to gain some information of another sort, do you think it ought to be allowed?"
"And who will prevent it, darling? That is the question," said Kathleen in her softest voice.
Alice was silent.
"I tell you what," said Kathleen. "When I see you beginning to help your poor, exhausted mother, and running messages for that overworked slavey—I think you call her Maria—then perhaps I'll do less. And when there's some one else to mend the boys' socks, perhaps I won't offer; but until there is, the less you say about such things the better, Miss Alice Tennant."
Ben kicked David under the table, and David kicked him back to stay quiet. Altogether the breakfast was a noisy one.
Kathleen went to school quite prepared to carry out her promise to Susy Hopkins. She had neatly packed the little Irish diamond brooch in a box, and had slipped under it a tiny note:
"Get as many foundation girls as you can to meet me, at whatever place you like to appoint, this evening. I have a plan to propose.—Kathleen O'Hara.
"P.S.—You can name the place by pinning a note under my desk. Be sure you all come. The plan is gloryious."
The thought of the note and the plan and the little brooch kept Kathleen in a fairly good humor on her walk to school. There she saw Ruth Craven. She was decidedly angry with Ruth for having, as she said to herself, "snubbed her" the day before. But beauty always had a curious effect on the Irish girl, and when she observed Ruth's really exquisite little face, clear cut as a cameo, with eyes full of expression, and watched the lips ready to break into the gentlest smiles, Kathleen said to herself:
"It is all over with me. She is the only decent-looking colleen I have met in this God-forsaken country. Make up to her I will."
She dashed, therefore, almost rudely through a great mass of incoming girls, and seized Ruth by her shoulder.
"Ruth," she said, "go and talk to Susy Hopkins during recess. She will have something to say, and I want you so badly. You won't refuse me, will you, Ruth?"
"But I don't know what you want," said Ruth.
"Go and talk to Susy Hopkins; she will know. Oh, there she is!"
"Kathleen, Kathleen!" called out Alice. "The school-bell has just rung, and they are opening the doors. Come do come."
"In a jiff," replied Kathleen.
She ran up to Susy.
"This is what I promised," she said; "and there is a note inside. Read it, and give me the answer where I have asked you."
Susy Hopkins, a most ordinary little girl, who had no position of any sort in the school, colored high with delight. Some of the paying girls looked at her in astonishment. Susy walked into the school with her head high in the air; she quite adored Kathleen, for she was making her a person of great distinction.
"We are going to have a glorious time," whispered Susy to Kate Rourke as they made their way to their respective classes.
Susy was small, rather stupid, and absolutely unimportant. Kate was big, black-eyed, impudent. She was jealous of the paying girls of the school; but she treated Susy as some one beneath contempt.
"Don't drag my sleeve," she replied crossly. "And what you do mean by a glorious time? I don't understand you."
"You will presently," said Susy. "And when all is said and done, you will have to remember that you owe it to me. But I have no time to talk now; only meet me, and bring as many of the foundationers as you can collect into the left-hand corner of the playground, just behind the Botanical Laboratory, at recess."
Kate made no answer, unless a toss of her head could have been taken as a reply. Her first impulse was to take no notice of Susy's remarks—little Susy Hopkins, the daughter of a small stationer in the town, a girl who had scarcely scraped through in her examination. It was intolerable that she should put on such airs.
The work of the school began, and all the girls were busy. Kate was clever, and she meant to try for one of the big scholarships. She would get her forty pounds a year when the time came, and go to Holloway College or some other college. She was not a lady by birth; she had not a single instinct of a true lady within her; but she was intensely ambitious. She did not care so much for beauty as for style; she made style her idol. The look that Cassandra wore as she walked quietly across the room, the set of her dress, the still more wonderful set of her head as it was placed on her queenly young shoulders—these were the things that burnt into Kate's soul and made her restless and dissatisfied. She would willingly have given all her father's wealth—and he was quite well-to-do for his class—- to have Cassandra's face, Cassandra's voice, Cassandra's figure. Cassandra was not at all a pretty girl, but her appearance appealed to all the wild ambitions in Kate's soul. She had a jealous contempt of Ruth Craven, who, although a foundation girl, managed to look like a lady; but her envy was centered round Cassandra. As to the Irish girl, she had scarcely noticed her up to the present.
Work went on that morning with much verve and vigor. It was a pleasant morning: the windows were open; the schoolrooms were all well ventilated; the teachers, the best of their kind, were stimulating in their lectures and in their conversation. There was a look of business and animation throughout the whole place: it was like a hive of bees. At last the moment of recess arrived. Kate just raised her head, looked over the shoulders of her companions, and saw Susy Hopkins darting restlessly about, catching one girl by the sleeve, another by the arm, whispering in the ear of a third, flinging her arm round the neck of a fourth; and as she spoke to the girls they looked interested, astonished, and cordial. They moved away to that lonely part of the playground which was situated at the back of the Botanical Laboratory. Kate had made up her mind not to take the least notice of Susy. She was pacing up and down alone; for, most provoking, all her chosen friends had gone off with that young lady. Suddenly she saw Ruth Craven going very quietly by. By all the laws of the foundationers, Ruth ought to speak to her companions in misfortune. Kate rushed up to her.
"What are they all doing there?" she said. "Do you happen to know Susy Hopkins?"
"No," replied Ruth gently. "She came up to me just now and asked me to join her and some other girls at the back of the Laboratory. I don't know that I want to."
"I am curious," said Kate. "Of course, I am no friend of Susy's; she is a most contemptible little wretch; but I may as well know what it is all about. Come with me, won't you?"
Ruth hesitated.
"Come along; we may as well know. There is probably some mischief on foot, and it is only fair that we should be forewarned."
"I don't want to know," said Ruth; but as Kate slipped her hand through her arm and pulled her along, she said resignedly, "Well, if I must I must."
As they strolled across the big playground, Ruth turned and glanced at Cassandra; but Cassandra was busy making friends with Florence, who was very angry with her for her desertion of the day before, and took no notice of Ruth. The Irish girl was nowhere in sight. Ruth sighed and continued her walk with Kate.
The most lonely and most dreary part of the playground was that little portion which was situated at the back of the Laboratory. Nothing grew there; the ground was innocent of grass, and much worn by the tramping of young feet. There were swings and garden-seats and preparations for tennis and other games in the rest of the big playground, but nothing had ever been done at the back of the Laboratory. When the two girls arrived they found five other girls waiting for them. Their names were, of course, Susy Hopkins, who considered herself on this delightful occasion quite the leader; a gentle and refined-looking girl of the name of Mary Rand; Rosy Myers, who was pretty and frivolous, with dark eyes and fair hair; Clara Sawyer, who was renowned for her vulgar taste in dress; and Hannah Johnson, a heavy-looking girl with a scowling brow and a very pronounced jaw. Hannah Johnson was about the plainest girl in the school. When Susy saw Kate Rourke and Ruth Craven she uttered a little scream of delight.
"Now we are complete," she said. "Listen to me, all you girls, for I haven't too long in which to tell you; that horrid bell will ring us back to lessons and dullness in less than no time. The most wonderful, delightful chance is offered to us. I met her yesterday, and she decided to do it. She is a brick of bricks. She will make the most tremendous difference in our lives. You know, although you pretend not to feel it, but you all must know how we foundationers are sat upon and objected to in the school. We bear it as meekly as we can for the sake of our so-called advantages; but if we can be snubbed, we are, and if we can be neglected, we are—although it isn't the teachers we have to complain of, but the girls. Sometimes things are past bearing, and yet we are powerless. There are three hundred paying girls, and there are one hundred foundationers. What chance has one hundred against three?"
"What is the good of bringing all that up, Susy?" said Mary Rand. "We are foundationers, and we ought to be thankful."
"The education is splendid; we ought not to forget that," said Ruth Craven.
Susy turned on Ruth as though she would like to eat her.
"It is all very fine for you," she said. "Just because you happen to be pretty, they take you up. I wonder one of your fine friends doesn't pay for you, and so save your position out and out."
"I wouldn't allow her to," replied Ruth, her eyes flashing fire. "I had much rather be a foundationer. I mean to prove that I am every bit as good as a paying girl. I mean to make you all respect me, so there!"
"That'll do, Spitfire," said Kate Rourke. "The time is passing, and we must get to the bottom of Susy Hopkins's remarkable address.—What's up, Susy? What's up?"
"This," said Susy. "You know the Irish girl who has come to live with the Tennants?"
"Can't say I do," said Kate.
"Well, you will soon. She's a regular out-and-out beauty."
"I know her," cried Ruth Craven. "She is most lovely."
"She's better," said Susy; "she's bewitching. See; she gave me this." Here she pointed proudly to the Irish diamond brooch, which she had stuck in the bosom of her dress. The diamond had been polished, and flashed brightly; the silver setting was also as good as was to be found. The girls crowded round to admire, and "Oh, my!" "Oh, dear!" "Did you ever?" and "Well, I never!" sounded on all sides.
"You will be so set up now, Susan Hopkins, that we won't be able to bear you in the same class," said Clara Sawyer.
"Go on," exclaimed Hannah Johnson—"go on and tell us what you want. Your horrid brooch doesn't interest us. What have you got to say?"
"You are mad with jealousy, and you know it," answered Susy. "Well, I am coming to the great news. The Irish girl's name is Kathleen O'Hara, and she comes from a castle over in the wild west of Ireland. Her father is very rich, and he keeps dogs and horses and carriages and—oh, everything that rich people keep. Compared to the other girls in the school, she is ten times a lady; and she has a true lady's heart. And she has taken a dislike, as far as I can see, to Alice Tennant."
"And I'm sure I'm not surprised," said Rosy Myers.
"Stuck-up thing!" said Clara Sawyer.
"Dirt beneath our feet!" exclaimed Hannah Johnson.
"Well; she doesn't like her either, though she doesn't use that kind of language," continued Susy. "Anyhow, she wants to befriend us—Oh, do let me speak!"—as Kate interrupted with a hasty exclamation. "She thinks that we are just as good as herself. There is no false pride about a real lady, girls; and the end of it is that she has a plan to propose—something for our benefit and for her benefit. See for yourselves; this is her letter. It is in her own beautiful Irish, handwriting. You can read it, only don't tear it all to bits."
The girls did read the letter. They pressed close together, and one peeped over the shoulder of her companion, another stood on tiptoe, while a third tried to snatch the letter from the hand of her fellow; but all managed to read the words: "Get as many foundation girls as you can to meet me, at whatever place you like to appoint, this evening. I have a plan to propose." This letter and the end of the postscript excited the girls; there was no doubt whatever of that. "The plan is gloryious." They laughed at the word, smiled into each others' faces, and stood very close together consulting.
"The old quarry," whispered Rosy.
"That's the place!" exclaimed Mary.
"Let us meet her, we seven by ourselves," was Kate's final suggestion. "We will then know what she wants, and if there is anything in it. We can form a committee, and get other girls to join by degrees. Hurrah! I do say this is fun."
Susy was now quite petted by her companions. The conference hastily ended, and on entering the school Susy pinned a piece of paper under Kathleen's desk, on which she wrote: "The old quarry; nine o'clock this evening. Will meet you at a quarter to nine outside Mrs. Tennant's house."
When Kathleen received the communication her eyes flashed with delighted fire. She thrust the letter into her pocket and proceeded with her work. The Irish girl looked quite happy that day; she had something to interest her at last. Her lessons, too, were by no means distasteful. She had a great deal of quick wit and ready perception. Hitherto she had been taught anyhow, but now she was all keen to receive real instruction. Her intuitions were rapid indeed; she could come to startlingly quick conclusions, and as a rule her guesses were correct rather than otherwise. Kathleen had a passion for music; she had never been properly taught, but the soul of music was in her as much as it was in David Tennant. She had a beautiful melodious voice, which had, of course, not yet come to maturity. Just before the end of the morning she took her first lesson in music. Her mistress was a very amiable and clever woman of the name of Agnes Spicer. Miss Spicer put a sheet of music before her.
"Play that," she said.
Kathleen frowned. Her delicate white fingers trembled for an instant on the keys. She played one or two bars perforce and very badly; then she dashed the sheet of music in an impetuous way to the floor.
"I can't," she said; "it isn't my style. May I play you something different?"
Miss Spicer was about to refuse, but looking at the girl, whose cheeks were flushed and eyes full of fire, she changed her mind.
"Just this once," she said; "but you must begin to practice properly. What I call amateur music can't be allowed here."
"Will this be allowed?" said Kathleen.
She dashed into heavy chords, played lightly a delicate movement, and then broke into an Irish air, "The Harp that once through Tara's Halls." From one Irish melody to another her light fingers wandered. She played with perfect correctness—with fire, with spirit. Soon she forgot herself. When she stopped, tears were running down her cheeks.
"What is music, after all," she said, looking full into the face of her teacher, "when you are far from the land you love? How can you stand music then? No, I don't mean to learn music at the Great Shirley School; I can't. When I am back again at home I shall play 'The Harp that once through Tara's Halls,' but I can't do it justice here. You will excuse me; I can't. I am sorry if I am rude, but it isn't in me. Some time, if you have a headache and feel very bad, as my dear father does sometimes, I shall play to you; but I can't learn as the other girls learn—it isn't in me."
Again she put her fingers on the keys of the piano and brought forth a few sobbing, broken-hearted notes. Then she started up.
"I expect you will punish me for this, Miss Spicer, but I am sorry—I can't help myself."
Strange to say, Miss Spicer did not punish her. On the contrary, she took her hand and pressed it.
"I won't ask you to do any more to-day," she said. "I see you are not like others. I will talk the matter over with you to-morrow."
"And you will find me unchanged," said Kathleen. "Thank you, all the same, for your forbearance."
CHAPTER VI.
THE POOR TIRED ONE.
Mrs. Tennant spent the afternoon out shopping. She told the girls at dinner that she would be home for tea, that she expected to be rather tired, and hoped that they would be as good as possible. The boys were always out during the afternoon, and as a rule never returned until after tea; but Alice and Kathleen were expected to be in for this meal. When Mrs. Tennant walked down the street, Kathleen went to the window and looked after her.
"What are you going to do this afternoon?" said Alice, who was lying back in an easy-chair with an open novel in her hand.
"I don't know," replied Kathleen. "What a dull hole this is! How can you have grown up and kept well in a place like this?"
"Opinions differ with regard to its dullness," said Alice. "I think our home a very pleasant, entertaining place. I wouldn't live in your wild castle for all you could give me."
"Nobody asked you, my dear," said Kathleen, with a saucy nod of her head.
She left the room and went up to what she called her half of the bedroom on the next floor. She knelt down by the window and looked across over the ugly landscape. There were houses everywhere—not a scrap of real country, as she expressed it, to be found. She took out of her pocket the letter which the foundation girls had sent her, and opened and read it.
"The old quarry! I wonder where the old quarry is," she thought. "It must be a good way from here. We have such a place at home, too. I did not suppose one was to be found in this horrid part of the world. I am rather glad there is an old quarry; it was quite nice of little Susy to suggest it, and she will meet me, the little colleen. That is good. What fun! I shall probably have to return through the bedroom window, so I may as well explore and make all in readiness. Dear, dear! I should like David to help me. It isn't the naughtiness that I care about, but it is the fun of being naughty; it is the fun of having a sort of dangerous thing to do. That is the real joy of it. It is the ecstacy of shocking the prim Alice! Oh! there is her step. She's coming up, the creature! Now then, I had best be as mum as I can unless I want to distract the poor thing entirely."
Alice entered the room.
"Do you greatly object to shutting the window?" she said to Kathleen. "I have a slight cold, and the draught will make it worse."
"Why, then, of course, darling," said Kathleen in a hearty voice, as she brought down the window with a bang. "Would you like me to shut the ventilator in the grate?" she then asked.
"No. How silly you are!"
"Is it silly? I thought you had a cold. You are afraid of the draughts. Why are you going out?"
"I want to see a school friend."
"You will be back in time for tea, won't you?"
"Can't say."
"But your mother, the poor tired one, asked you to be back."
"I do wish, Kathleen, that you wouldn't call mother by that ridiculous name. She is no more tired than—than other women are."
"If that is the case," said Kathleen, "I heartily hope that I shall not live to be a woman. I wouldn't like us all to be as fagged as she is—poor, dear, gentle soul! She's overworked, and that's the truth."
Kathleen saw that she was annoying Alice, and proceeded with great gusto to expand her theory with regard to Mrs. Tennant.
"She's in the condition when she might drop any time," she said. "We have had old Irishwomen overworked like that, and all of a sudden they went out like snuffs: that is what happens. What are you putting on your best hat for?"
"That is no affair of yours."
"Oh, hoity-toity, how grand we are! Do you know, Alice, you haven't got at all nice manners. You think you have, but you haven't. We are never rude like that in Ireland. We tell a few lies now and then, but they are only polite lies—the kind that make other people happy. Alice, I should like to know which is best—to be horribly cross, or to tell nice polite lies. Which is the most wicked? I should like to know."
"Then I will tell you," said Alice. "What you call a nice lie is just a very great and awful sin; and if you don't believe me, go to church and listen when the commandments are read."
"In future," said Kathleen very calmly, "now that I really know your views, I will always tell you home truths. You can't blame me, can you?"
Alice deigned no answer. She went downstairs and let herself out of the house.
"And that is the sort of girl I have exchanged for daddy and the mother and the boys," thought the Irish girl. "Oh, dear! oh, dear!"
Kathleen flew downstairs. It was nearly three o'clock; tea was to be on the table at half-past four. Quick as thought she dashed into the kitchen.
"Maria," she said, "and cook, is there anything nice and tasty for tea this evening?"
"Nice and tasty, miss!" said cook. "And what should there be nice and tasty? There's bread, and there's butter—Dorset, second-class Dorset—and there's jam (if there's any left); and that's about all."
"That sort of tea isn't very nourishing, cook, is it? I ask because I want to know," said Kathleen.
"It's the kind we always have at Myrtle Lodge," replied cook. "I don't hold with it, but then it's the way of the missis."
"I have got some money in my pocket," said Kathleen. "I want to have a beautiful, nice tea. Can't you think of something to buy? Here's five shillings. Would that get her a nice tea?"
"A nice tea!" cried Maria. "It would get a beautiful meal; and the poor missis, she would like it."
"Then go out, Maria; do, like a darling. I will open the door for you if anybody calls. Do run round the corner and bring in—Oh! I know what. We'll have sausages—they are delicious—and a little tin of sardines—won't they be good?—and some water-cress, and some shrimps—oh, yes, shrimps! Be quick! And we will put out the best tea-things, and a clean cloth; and it will rest the poor tired one so tremendously when she comes in and sees a good meal on the table."
Both cook and Maria were quite excited. Perhaps they had an eye to the reversion of the tea, the sausages, the sardines, the shrimps, and the water-cress.
Maria went out, and Kathleen stood in the hall. Two or three people arrived during Maria's absence, and Kathleen went promptly to the door and said, "Not at home, ma'am," in a determined voice, and with rather a scowling face, to these arrivals. Some of the visitors left rather important messages, but Kathleen did not remember them for more than a moment after they were delivered. Maria presently came back and the tea-table was laid. Kathleen gave Maria sixpence for the washing of an extra cloth, and the well-spread table looked quite fresh and wonderfully like a school-feast.
When Mrs. Tennant returned (she came in looking very hot and tired), it was to see the room tidy, Kathleen seated in her own special chair cobbling the boys' socks as hard as she could, and an appetizing tea on the table.
"What does this mean?" said Mrs. Tennant.
"It means," said Kathleen, jumping up, "that you are to plant yourself just here, and you are not to stir. Oh, I know you are dead tired. I will take off your shoes, poor dear; I have brought your slippers down on purpose, and you are to have your tea at this little table. Now what will you have? Hot sausages?—They are done to a turn, aren't they, Maria?"
"That they are, miss."
"A nice hot sausage on toast, and a lovely cup of tea with cream in it."
"But—but," said Mrs. Tennant, "what will Alice say?"
"Maria and I don't care twopence what Alice says. This is my tea, and Maria fetched it. Now then, dear tired one, eat and rest."
Mrs. Tennant looked at Kathleen with loving eyes.
"Did you buy these things?" she said.
"That she did, ma'am," cried Maria. "I never did see a more thoughtful young lady."
"My dear child," said Mrs. Tennant, "you are too good."
Kathleen laughed.
"If there is one thing I am, it is not that," she said. "I am not a bit good. I am as wild and naughty and——Oh, but don't let us talk about me. I am so hungry. You know I didn't much like your dinner to-day. I am not fond of those watery stews. Of course, I can eat anything, but I don't specially like them; so if you don't mind I will have a sausage, too, and a plateful of shrimps afterwards, and some sardines. And isn't this water-cress nice? The leaves are not quite so brown as I should like. Oh, we did have such lovely water-cress in the stream at home! Mrs. Tennant, you must come back with me to Carrigrohane some day, and then you will have a real rest."
Mrs. Tennant, feeling very much like a naughty child herself, enjoyed her tea. She and Kathleen laughed over the shrimps, exclaimed at the fun of eating the water-cress, enjoyed the sausages, and each drank four cups of tea. It was when the meal had come to an end that Kathleen said calmly:
"Three or four, or perhaps five, ladies called while Maria was out."
"Who were they, dear?"
"I don't know. They left messages, and I have forgotten them. One lady was dressed in what I should call a very loud style. She was quite old. Her face was all over wrinkles. She was stout, and she wore a short jacket and a big—very big—picture-hat."
"You don't mean," said Mrs. Tennant, "that Mrs. Dalzell has called? She is one of my most important friends. She promised to help me with regard to David's future. What did she say—can't you remember?"
"I am ever so sorry, but I can't. I kept staring at her hat all the time. I don't remember anything about her except that she was old and had wrinkles and a big picture-hat—the sort of hat that Ruth Craven would look pretty in."
Mrs. Tennant began to find the remembrance of her delightful tea a little depressing, for, question Kathleen as she might, she did not remember anything about the ladies except a few fugitive descriptions. As far as Mrs. Tennant could make out, people who were of the greatest importance to her had left messages, and yet none of the messages could be attended to.
"I can't even imagine who the other ladies can be," she said. "But as to Mrs. Dalzell, she must not be neglected; I must go out and see her at once."
"Then you will be more tired than ever, and I have not done a scrap of good."
"You meant very kindly, my dear child, and have given me a delicious and strengthening tea. Only don't do it again, darling, for it is my place to give you tea, not yours to give it to me."