“No; and Mrs. Harper and Miss Letitia, when I asked them plump out one day, when I was staying in the neighbourhood and was having supper with them, denied it most emphatically. They were quite angry.”
“Oh!” exclaimed Mrs. Leach, with a gasp of disappointment. “Hushed it up for the credit of the school, eh?”
“No, they said Miss Selina had made dreadful mischief, and been the cause of Madeline being sent away for a little time; but we have never heard Miss Selina’s version of the story,” she added expressively.
“Where is she now?”
“Oh, she married a clergyman much younger than herself, and has gone to the South Sea islands.”
“Yes, well out of the way. And are you intimate with Miss West?”
“No; we had a quarrel the last year she was at school with me, and did not speak for months.”
“What was it about?”
“Oh, something trivial—hairpins, I think, or not passing the butter; but I never really liked her. Still, for old times’ sake, I have sometimes thought of calling. My aunt, Lady Mac Weasle, knows her, and says the Wests give magnificent entertainments and go everywhere.”
“Yes?”