“Thank you very much,” said Caroline.
She stood there, shy and solemn, in the little short-sleeved, square-necked nightgown. She hardly knew whether to turn away or to linger. Because Cousin Penelope did not turn away.
Cousin Penelope seemed trying to speak, and apparently she did not find it easy.
“Jacqueline,” she brought out the words suddenly, “how long have you—taken lessons on the piano?”
“Always,” said Caroline truthfully, “except last winter.”
“Of course,” the thought flashed through Penelope’s mind, “they neglected her music at that horrid school where Edith Delane sent her—to get rid of her.” But what she said aloud to Caroline was: “Who taught you?”
No doubt Caroline ought to have said, “My mother,” and betrayed the whole deception that Jacqueline had led her into practicing. But it takes courage to destroy a lovely world in which, however undeservedly, one is very happy, especially when the destruction of that world would leave one cowering, a guilty wretch, before such a judge as Cousin Penelope, with her serene, high forehead.
“A—a lady taught me,” Caroline told a half-truth.
“She must have been quite a good teacher.”
Caroline nodded. The tears were near her eyelids.