Here was a poser! The girls looked crestfallen.
"No—you can't, of course," hesitated Janet.
"And besides that," went on Cecily, "this is the last time I shall go, anyhow, because she's very much better now,—the salve helped her ankle very much,—and she says she's going out herself after this. I don't expect to get out again."
There was a moment of horrified silence after this blow. Then Janet, no longer able to endure the bewilderment, burst out:
"Cecily dear, please forgive us if we seem to be prying into your affairs. It's only because we think so much of you. But who is Miss Benedict, and what is she to you?"
"I don't know!" said Cecily slowly.
"You don't know!" they gasped in chorus.
"No, I really don't. It must seem very strange to you, and it does to me. Miss Benedict is a perfect stranger to me, and no relation, so far as I know. I never saw or heard of her before I came here."
"But why are you here then?" demanded Marcia.
"I—don't know. It's all a mystery to me. But I'm so lonely I've cried myself to sleep many a night."