"Yes," assented Miss Orchardson coldly, "so you have actually lost nothing. I trust now that you recognise how cruel and unjustifiable your suspicion of Violet Wyndham has been."
"I—I knew she was poor," stammered Agnes, "and I thought she might have been tempted to take it, and—and—" She paused, quailing beneath the severity of the headmistress' gaze for a minute, then she admitted in an abashed tone: "I have been wrong."
"Very wrong," agreed Miss Orchardson; and, forthwith, she gave Agnes such a talking to as that young person had never listened to in her life before, so that when the girl left her presence, it was as though a veil had been torn from her eyes, and, for the first time, she saw in its true light her past conduct towards the school-fellow she had maligned, and very ugly and mean-spirited it looked.
[CHAPTER XXVI]
"NO SENSE OF HONOUR WHATEVER"
LOTTIE MEDLAND'S recovery from the serious illness which followed her accident was a slow one, and it was fully a month before she was able to come downstairs again, so that it was well on in November when she at last returned to her work at the factory, looking a pale, fragile girl, whose blue eyes had lost their old furtive, restless expression, and were grave and sad. Her former acquaintances declared she had altered wonderfully, and they soon discovered that the alteration was not only in her outward appearance.
"Bless me, child, how like you are growing to Malvina," Mrs. Medland observed, as she glanced at Lottie across the tea-table one evening, at the conclusion of what had been for both a hard day's work. "I'm glad to see it," she proceeded, as a flush of gratification rose to her daughter's wan cheeks, "and I'm not the only one who's noticed it, for Miss Ann remarked it to me the last time I saw her. I don't think it's so much that you're pale and thin, though may be that has something to do with it, for of course poor Malvina always looked more or less ill; no, I think, as Miss Ann said, that the likeness lies in the expression of your face—a certain look which one catches now and again."
"I am glad Miss Ann can see a likeness in me to Malvina," Lottie said softly. "Oh, mother, how good and considerate Miss Ann has been to me! I quite thought she'd turn from me in horror when she knew what a wicked girl I'd been, and, instead of doing that, she's been kinder than ever. And you, too, mother, you've never reproached me, never even scolded me—"
"Because I saw you were really repentant, Lottie," her mother interposed, "and you were so ill that I feared at one time I was to lose both my daughters. I thank God for sparing you to me, my dear child!"
"Oh, mother! And I have been such a trouble to you and such a disgrace! But I'll try to make amends, indeed I will! Please God I'll be a better daughter to you in the future, and I'll try to show people their goodness to me hasn't been thrown away. Bad girl as I've been, I've had the best friends in the world—Dr. Elizabeth, and Mrs. Reed and Miss Ann, and that pretty Miss Violet who has always a pleasant word for me whenever we meet. I told Dr. Elizabeth once that I'd never bet again; I meant to keep my word, but—I soon broke it. I'm not going to make any promise now, but I shall pray—oh, so earnestly—that I may be helped to turn away from temptation."