The Rebellion of Margaret

by Geraldine Mockler

"They'll improve your appetite," jeered her sister.

She waited until the two were out of hearing, and then turned eagerly to Hilary.

"Hilary," she said, "what is it? I can see you are suspicious of Miss Carson. Do tell me. Oh, how quick and clever you are! I am sure you do not like her. I believe you can read people's characters at a glance."

Hilary sniffed, a would-be modest, yet well-pleased sniff, which seemed to say that though it would not become her to endorse Joan's opinion of her talents, truth would not permit her to deny it.

"I know nothing for certain yet," she said darkly, "but I am on the watch. Miss Carson is not all she seems, mark my words."

The early dinner was rather an ordeal for Margaret. All the members of the family, including her two small pupils, who sat one on each side of her and behaved beautifully, were present, besides Anna Finch and a couple of Geoffrey's friends, motor-bicycle enthusiasts like himself, who had come over from Brighton that morning on their machines.

Had Margaret only been allowed to eat her dinner in silence she would not have found the meal as terrifying as she did. Hilary, it was, who would not permit that, for the second Miss Danvers sat opposite to her, and whenever there was a lull in the conversation she would lean across the table and ask Margaret questions about Hampstead. The questions were asked in such apparent innocence that none of the others guessed that she was trying to catch her out in her answers. But Margaret was only too miserably aware of that fact, and she wondered what it was that she could have said or done to raise suspicions about herself before she had even been twenty-four hours in the house. Hilary's sidelong glances and meaningly put questions worked upon her to such a pitch that she expected to hear her say any moment that an imposter sat at their table in the guise of Eleanor Carson. But she need not have feared such an immediate denouncement. Hilary's suspicions had by no means reached that point yet; even if they had she would not have given voice to them. She was enjoying her cat-and-mouse game far too much to wish to bring it to an end as yet, and several days went by without her doing more than making Margaret as uncomfortable as she could by sly questions and glances. Sometimes a whole meal would pass without her addressing a single word to Margaret, then, as the latter would begin to feel that her vague alarms were groundless, and that Hilary suspected nothing, sudden allusion to Hampstead, or the school where she was supposed to have taught so long, would set her trembling again.

In short, Hilary contrived to make Margaret's life a burden to her, and one night, the fourth since she had come to The Cedars, Margaret resolved that she could stand it no longer. She would make a clean breast of everything, own that she was at The Cedars under a false name, and that she had no right there at all, and go to Mrs. Murray.

The moment in which she took that resolve was the happiest she had known since she had come to The Cedars. For though she had been slow in confessing it even to herself, it was a fact that, quite apart from Hilary's quiet persecution of her, Margaret was not enjoying herself. It was quite evident to her by that time that none of the family, excepting her two pupils, and even they were to go away on the morrow to stay for a fortnight with an aunt of their father's, cared in the least for her. None of them included her in their plans or sought her society. Maud was out playing golf or tennis all day long; Hilary and Joan were inseparable, and though Nancy was kind it was only in a lazy, good-natured way that in the end counted for very little. The boys, though they were all, especially Geoffrey and Edward, quite nice to her rarely met her, except at meals, so that she could not depend upon them for companionship. And against all that Margaret had to set the constant necessity of weighing all her actions and words. It was even a strain always to have to remember that her name was Eleanor Carson.

What an immense relief it would be to be herself again, even though it meant going up to that solitary house on the downs where she would have only an old deaf lady for company!