"What! told you she meant to toady Rachel!—a likely story!"
"No, told me Rachel was an heiress."
"Well, suppose she is an heiress, what of that? You know perfectly well that Marion Berkley is not a girl to toady any one, and you ought to be ashamed of yourself for saying so. I'm sure every one could see that she has not treated Rachel very cordially, and if she invited her into her room it was on Flo's account, and I'm glad for one she showed her some kindness. No one but you would ever have put a bad motive on such a simple action."
"Thank you, Mattie, for defending me," quietly remarked Marion herself, as she passed through the library where the two girls were sitting, and went upstairs.
"There, Miss Graham, I hope you feel better now!" exclaimed Mattie, who was now thoroughly roused.
"Pooh! I don't care; 'listeners never hear any good of themselves;' she shouldn't have been eaves-dropping."
"That sounds well, Georgie, I must say, coming from you," replied Mattie. "She was in the school-room, and goodness knows we talked loud enough. Next time you have any such agreeable insinuations to make against one of your school-mates, you'll be kind enough to go to some one else;" and Mattie turned away indignantly, and left Georgie to her own reflections.
Finding that she had not been able to rouse any ill-will towards Marion in Mattie's breast, and inwardly provoked with herself for having proclaimed Rachel to be an heiress,—a fact which for reasons of her own she would have preferred to have remain a secret,—she left the hall, and entered the drawing-room, where most of the girls were congregated, thinking perhaps that there would be a better field for her operations.
Poor Marion had been cut to the quick by Georgie's remark; not on account of the source from which it came, but because she feared, that, through Georgie's manœuvring, it would become the general opinion of the scholars, and in her inmost heart Marion had hoped that she might not leave the school at the end of the year, without leaving behind her a better reputation than she had borne before.
She said nothing of this hope to any one, not even Florence, but had tried in many little things, principally in her manner, to be more kind to those of her school-mates who were not in any way attractive to her.