The tears forced themselves under the closed lids, but Lena gulped them back, and with them, all the softened thoughts that began to rise at her mother's words; and as she drove back the good, the wrong thoughts returned and filled the child's mind with seeds that were to reap a bitter harvest ere long.
CHAPTER VIII.
MILLY'S NEW HAT.
"I shall be sorry to have to keep you in this afternoon, Lena," said Miss Marshall; "but if you do not pay more attention to your lessons I shall be obliged to."
"They are so difficult," grumbled Lena.
"That is nonsense. Milly has said hers correctly, and surely you can do so also; you are not paying the slightest attention this morning."
"Of course Milly does it best when you help her," muttered Lena, but in tones loud enough to be heard by her governess.
Things went on from bad to worse. Lena was in a cross, stubborn mood. She was hugging to herself, as it were, the disappointment of the afternoon before, dwelling upon it, and looking at it over and over again in the light of her own wounded pride and vanity. This was the morning of the day they had all looked forward to with such pleasure, the day when they were all to have tea in the hay-field; and now, instead of getting through her lessons well and quickly, she was allowing her thoughts and attention to wander anywhere they would, except to the one place they ought to have rested on.
"Have you got a headache, Lena?" asked Miss Marshall at length, when her patience was nearly exhausted.
"No," was the short answer.