Helen cut the end of the envelope, and was soon lost in it. Smiles passed over her face, then she drew her brows in a little crease and the lips were pressed together with a touch of annoyance. Then the smiles again.
Mrs. Van Dorn had asked that Helen Grant should not be allowed to correspond with Mr. Warfield. She did not approve of his influence over Helen. It was too purely masculine. And Helen was too young to have a man friend. It might divide her school interest, and she had selected Aldred House because she wanted Helen to have the best feminine training.
Mrs. Aldred had smiled over this when she read Mrs. Van Dorn's letter. Strange that the fear should so soon have materialized.
"Will you please read it," asked Helen in a low tone. "I think he doesn't quite like a girls' school. And he is all for study. He would push anyone right straight along, and he believes my music would be wasted time. I dare say I confessed I was not very bright at it."
The letter was certainly unobjectionable, a little severe perhaps, betraying the school principal, but still showing the high esteem in which he held Helen's capabilities. Such a correspondence would not be likely to do any student harm.
"You see, Helen," she began in a tone of sweet friendliness, "I am answerable for the girls committed to my charge. Some of the older ones have young men friends who would be very glad to keep up a correspondence, and no doubt two or three years hence the girls would feel mortified at knowing letters of theirs were in the man's possession. I have known young lads to read letters aloud to their college or club friends. It is a demoralizing and indiscreet thing, and no high-minded mother would consent to her daughter doing it without her knowledge or inspection. One rule, therefore, must apply to all such correspondences without the mother's consent. A letter like this would do a girl no harm, indeed, I think your Mr. Warfield rather severe."
"I don't quite understand how I could have done it so carelessly," Helen said in her frank, honest way. "And I am very, very sorry. But I should like to write and explain to him why it is"—she cast about for a word—"inadmissable."
"Of course it is best to do that."
Helen glanced up in such a straightforward fashion. There was nothing concealed. And to make her renunciation still more earnest and the obedience more cheerful, she said:
"I don't mean that I shouldn't care for the letters, for I understand what Mr. Warfield means by every line, and sometimes it would be a pleasure to write to so good a friend, for after all I owe him the best fortune of my life. I am doing it without any demur because it is one of the rules of the school and I do honestly and truly wish to keep them."