"But they're not Protestants—I'm sure they're not," the girl returned hotly. "They shouldn't come to church with me; they only pretend. Besides, they don't follow the other girls about nearly as carefully. The worst of it is that I have to stay here for the holidays, too."
She seemed very miserable about it, and Barbara thought it might relieve her to confide in some one, and, after a little skilful questioning, the whole story came out.
Her mother was dead, and her father in the West Indies, and though she wrote him often and fully about everything, she never got any answers to her questions, so that she was sure people opened her letters and put in different news. She was afraid the same thing was done with her father's letters to her, because once something was said by mistake that could have been learned only by reading the news intended for her eyes alone.
"He never saw the place," the girl continued. "He took me to my aunt in England, who promised to find me a school. She thought the whole business a nuisance, and was only too glad to find a place quickly where they'd keep me for the holidays too. She never asks me to go to England—not that I would if she wanted me to."
There were angry tears in the girl's eyes, and Barbara thought the case really did seem rather a hard one, though it was clear her companion had been spoiled at home, and had probably had her own way before coming to school.
"It does sound rather horrid," Barbara agreed, "and three years must seem a long time; but it will go at last, you know."
The girl shook her head.
"Too slowly, far too slowly—it just crawls. I never have any one to talk things over with, either, you see, for I can't trust the French girls; they carry tales, I know. Even now—look how she watches me; she longs to know what I'm saying."
Barbara looked round, and it was true that the visitor seemed more interested in watching them than in Mademoiselle Thérèse's conversation; and, directly she caught Barbara's eye, she got up hastily and said they must go. Alice Meynell immediately relapsed into sulkiness again; but, just as she was saying good-bye, she managed to whisper—
"I shall run away soon. I know I can't stand it much longer."