"I'm sorry, dear—very sorry!" she said, as she introduced Gipsy to her attic bedroom. "I don't like to have to turn you out of your dormitory—and I'm sure Miss Poppleton doesn't either! But, you see, we're obliged to put Leonora there—and there's no other place but this. If your father hadn't behaved so queerly, of course it would have been different. I'm very sorry, Gipsy—it's hard on a girl to be left like this. I wonder he could have the heart to do it. And it's hard on my sister too. She has to think of ways and means. Dear, dear! what an amount of trouble there is in the world! And you're young to have to begin to feel it. There! I've made you as comfortable as I can here, child. After all, you'll be downstairs most of your time."
When Miss Edith had gone away, Gipsy sat down on the one chair in her room, with a blank, wretched feeling that was beyond the relief of tears. It was not that she minded a camp bed in the least, and she had often slept in far rougher places than her new attic; but the change seemed the outward and visible sign of her forlorn circumstances. Both Miss Poppleton's uncompromising remarks and Miss Edith's well-meant sympathy hurt her equally, for both expressed the same doubt of her father's honour. Not until that afternoon had Gipsy thoroughly realized how utterly alone she was in the world. Every other girl in the school had home and parents and relations, while she had nobody at all except a father who had—no, not forgotten her! that she would never allow; but for some strange, mysterious reason had been kept from communicating with her.
Gipsy had too generous a nature to bear Leonora any grudge for having taken her place in the dormitory. She even volunteered to give some valuable hints to the newcomer, knowing by experience the thorns that were likely to beset her path. Leonora, however, did not seem at all afflicted by many things which would have been most trying to Gipsy. She went her own way stolidly, without reference to her schoolfellows' comments, good or bad. This attitude did not satisfy Briarcroft standards, and by the time she had been there a week she had been weighed in the balance of public opinion and found decidedly wanting. She was the exact opposite of what the boarders had expected. Far from being liberally disposed, and inclined to spend her superabundant pocket-money for the good of her companions, she appeared anxious to take advantage on the other side. She readily accepted all the chocolates and caramels that were offered her, but made no return; and if she bought any sweets she ate them herself in privacy. She appropriated other girls' hockey sticks, books, or fountain pens unblushingly, but had always an excuse if anyone wished to sample her possessions.
"She's the meanest thing I ever met in my life," said Lennie Chapman indignantly one day. "She borrowed my penknife three times this morning, and when I asked her what had become of her own, she said it was such a nice one, it seemed a pity to use it."
"She spoilt my stylo. yesterday," complained Norah Bell, "and she never even offered to buy me another."
"She's greedy, too," said Daisy Scatcherd, swelling the list of Leonora's crimes. "When I handed her my box of candied fruits, she picked out the very biggest!"
"How piggie!"
"And yet she's plenty of pocket-money."
"Oh, yes, heaps, as much as she likes to ask for."
"I don't see what's the use of being a millionairess if you're a miser at the same time!" remarked Dilys scornfully.