"Well, I'm sure I don't know," replied Mrs. Beauchamp, while her face still wore its perturbed look; "Monica is so rash, she would be just as likely to choose a butcher's or grocer's daughter as any one else."
"I doubt if there are many there," said Mr. Bertram, smiling. "I have always heard that the Osmington school is one of the best, and Mr. Drury and Canon Monroe have daughters there, as well as many other leading families."
"If the Osmington clergy think the school is good enough, I suppose it is all right," agreed his client, not without some misgivings, still. "The distance is the difficulty; but Barnes must accompany Monica, and the regular walks will, no doubt, be good for her."
"The majority of the pupils who live at a distance bicycle there," observed the lawyer.
"Most unwomanly!" was Mrs. Beauchamp's horrified reply. "I cannot imagine what the mothers of the present day are dreaming of. We might as well have no girls at all; they seem to become boys as soon as they can toddle. No, Monica shall not have a bicycle. If she must go to the school, she must; but she will walk when fine, and Richards will have to drive her in the brougham when it is wet. I suppose--oh, dear me! I do wish she had been reasonable and got on with her governesses."
With an almost imperceptible shrug of his shoulders, Mr. Bertram bade his client good-day, having undertaken to make all necessary arrangements. He was a childless man himself, but he felt sure that had he possessed a high-spirited daughter like Monica, he could have improved upon Mrs. Beauchamp's method of up-bringing.
CHAPTER II.
"SUCH A DEAR LITTLE MONKEY!"
But there were weightier matters in the lawyer's mind than the choice of a school for incorrigible girls, and he was soon pondering deeply over a compensation case, as he strode along the stretch of almost countrified road which connected the residential district of Mydenham with the parent town of Osmington.
He was nearing the latter, and had just consulted his watch, in view of an important appointment, when, turning a corner sharply, he collided with a young lady of nineteen or thereabouts, who, with a small brother and sister, was coming in the opposite direction.