“I draw the line at snakes,” returned Celia. “I suppose you feel sorry for Miss Newman.”
“Yes, I do; she is so unpretty.”
Celia laughed. “That is a delicate way of putting it, I am sure. Well, I am glad she has one friend; no doubt she needs it. Most of the girls aren’t so ready to say nice things of her as they were of Miss Ashurst.”
“I know it,” replied Edna, “and that is one reason Dorothy and I stand up for her. We say suppose we were as—as ugly as that, and had to go a long, long way to school every day to teach horrid girls who didn’t be nice to us, how would we like it?”
“She looks like a cross old thing,” returned Celia rather flippantly.
“She isn’t exactly cross, but she isn’t the kind you can lean up against and say ‘what a pretty tie you have on,’ as we did with Miss Ashurst. Celia, I am afraid Miss Newman never will get married.”
Celia laughed. “Perhaps she doesn’t want to. Everyone doesn’t, you know.”
This was rather beyond Edna’s comprehension, and she sat pondering over the extraordinary statement till the car reached the station. She arrived early in the school-room on Monday morning to find Miss Newman already there. She looked up with a smile as the little girl entered. “I brought back your umbrella,” she said. “I don’t know what I should have done without it. I left my sister rather worse than usual and I wanted very much to get home as soon as possible.”
“Is your sister ill?” asked Edna
“She is never very well. When she was a little girl, younger than you, she fell and hurt her spine. She has never been well since, and at times suffers very much.”