“You know, I believe Madame Elena knows about it,” said Rosie, giggling, precluded by Mrs. Entwhistle’s presence from making use of the auburn-headed principal’s usual sobriquet of “Old Peroxide.”
It was quite true that Madame Elena was inclined to favour Gina. Lydia had noticed it with resentment.
When Rosie Graham’s shrewdness was justified, as it almost invariably was, by the event, and Madame Elena showed definite signs of partisanship in the quarrel, Gina became established as the heroine of the hour.
One afternoon, just before closing time, she suddenly burst into tears after a prolonged search for a mislaid pencil—that eternal preoccupation of the shop-girl’s day.
“Don’t cry,” said Lydia very gently, and feeling very impatient, since she disliked any display of emotion in other people—unless it was directly concerned with herself.
“I’ll lend you mine.”
Such a loan was unheard of, for the pencils, suspended by a chain from each girl’s waist, were in constant use, and the rule obliged each one to provide her own.
“Oh, I don’t care,” sobbed Gina, recklessly noisy. “Thanks most awfully, dear. I know it’s sweet of you—but I’m fed up with everything.”
She sank into a chair, still sobbing hysterically.
“So are we all,” said Miss Saxon low and viciously, looking up from the drawer before which she was kneeling, carefully swathing some frail chiffon scarves in tissue-paper. “So are we all, I should imagine, in this heat and all, but we don’t make a song and dance about it, I suppose. What I should call absolute carrying on for notice.”