"I can't trust myself in it, Aunt Kate. It's too beautiful. It's fine enough for a princess."
But after Aunt Kate had explained that if Mary Rose did not wear the dress she might have to go to jail Mary Rose had no choice. She would have to wear the frock and go to school and try her very hardest not to be proud. She had only to think of Jenny Lind to humble her spirit.
She was very sedate as she walked with Aunt Kate. It did not seem possible that at last she was going to enter the big school building with towers and battlements enough for a fortress.
"It is like a castle. I don't care what Mr. Jerry said," she told Aunt Kate as they went up the steps and into the principal's office where a pleasant-faced middle-aged lady looked questioningly at Mary Rose and asked how old she was.
From force of habit Aunt Kate said hastily: "Goin' on fourteen."
"Fourteen!" The principal was plainly astonished. "She's very small for her age. And backward if she is only in the sixth grade. She should be in high school at fourteen. Has she been ill?"
Backward! It was bad enough to be called small for her age, but to be told that she was stupid was more than Mary Rose could bear in silence. She opened her mouth to explain and then she remembered that she had promised she would mortify her pride so she said never a word, although she thought she would burst at having to keep quiet. But Aunt Kate's pride was also touched and she stammered hurriedly that she should have said her niece was going on eleven.
"That sounds more normal." And the principal smiled as she led the way into a big sunny room full of children. Mary Rose drew a sigh of relief when she saw the teacher. Mr. Jerry was all wrong about her, for she was not an old witch. She was as pretty a young woman as any child could wish to have for a teacher. She smiled at Mary Rose in a very friendly fashion and found her a seat beside a little girl with wonderful long yellow curls. It was delightful to be with children again and Mary Rose's face rivaled the sun.
Aunt Kate had a strange ache in her heart as she watched her. Mary Rose would make friends here, friends of her own age, and she would miss her. But that was the way of the world, she thought philosophically. When she was quite convinced that Mary Rose was happy and contented and could find her way home alone she left the school.
Mrs. Bracken called to her from her window as she passed and she went in to be introduced to Mrs. Bracken's niece, Harriet White.