“My dear, how desperately practical you always are! It’s positively comic. Do you know, that I’m sometimes tempted to think that you and I represent the two types——”
“Martha and Mary,” Bertha unkindly forestalled her friend’s seasoned witticism. “I know, dear, though perhaps there’s a good deal more of the Mary in me than you suppose—but I know it’s difficult to judge of people who have the misfortune to be as reserved as I am. However, if you really have taken a fancy to this scheme, by all means let Francie go with you. I shall be only too delighted, and it will be a relief to Minnie.”
“Poor Miss Blandflower! I can’t quite see her in a convent atmosphere, I admit.”
“Qu’ allait-elle faire dans cette galère,” hummed Bertha.
Nina, who did not like Bertha’s admirable French accent, immediately gave a small excruciated shriek.
“Out of tune, my dear! You were at least a semitone out—Aic!”
The annoyance which is common to everybody when accused, whether falsely or otherwise, of singing out of tune, was evident on Bertha’s broad, good-humoured face, and went some way towards consoling Nina for a rather impulsive decision.
Some few days later, she and Frances Grantham went together to the convent.
“I’m glad the Retreat doesn’t begin till the day after to-morrow,” said Frances rather nervously, as they waited outside the tall, narrow building, situated at the extreme end of the small provincial town. “It will give us time to get used to everything, and perhaps to know one or two of the nuns.”
“The Superior’s letter to me was charming,” said Nina firmly, “quite charming, and I almost feel as though I knew her already. Somehow one has a sort of awareness of anyone with whom one is in tune, don’t you think so? It’s almost a sense of recognition.”