"That I will," Mona answered cordially. "I have promised to spend the summer holidays with some friends, but I will come to you for a week, in the first instance, if you will be kind enough to take me in,—the second week of August."
And the reader will be glad to know that, if ever human being had a guilty conscience, Mona had one at that moment.
The second week of August! How her heart beat at the thought of it! The examination would be over. With his short-sighted eyes, Dr Dudley would probably never have seen her at Burlington House; and down at Castle Maclean, with the sunshine dancing on the water, and the waves plashing softly on the beach below, she would tell him the whole story, before the lists came out and betrayed her. In the exultation of that moment, the very possibility of another failure did not occur to her. The lists would appear in the course of the week, and they two would con the results together. She would humble herself, if need were, and ask his pardon for having in a sense deceived him; but surely there would be no need. Everything would be easy and natural and beautiful—in the second week of August!
There was much surprise, considerable regret, and not a little genuine sorrow, when the news of Miss Maclean's departure became known; but perhaps no one felt it so keenly as Auntie Bell. The old woman expected little of men, and, as a rule, found in them as much as she expected. Of women she had constantly before her so lofty a type, in her hard-working, high-souled, keen-witted self, that her female neighbours were a constant source of disappointment to her. She had been prejudiced in Mona's favour for her father's sake, and the young girl had more than answered to her expectations. Miss Maclean had some stuff in her, the old woman used to say, and that was more than one could say of most of the lassies one met.
One day towards the end of February, Auntie Bell packed a basket with the beautiful new-laid eggs that were beginning to be plentiful, and set out, for the first time in many months, to pay a visit to Rachel Simpson. To her inward delight she met two of Mr Brown's sisters as she passed through the streets of Kilwinnie.
"Where are you going, Mrs Easson?" asked one. "It's not often we see you here now-a-days."
Auntie Bell looked keenly up through the gold-rimmed spectacles.
"Whaur wad I be gaun?" she asked grimly, "but tae see Miss Maclean? She's for leavin' us."
"Why is she going? I understood she was making herself quite useful to Miss Simpson in the shop."
"Quite usefu'!" Auntie Bell could scarcely keep her indignation within bounds. "I fancy she is quite usefu'—mair's the peety that the same canna be maintained o' some o' the lave o' us. Miss Simpson wad gie her een tae gar her bide, I'm thinkin'. But what is there here tae keep a leddy like yon? Hae ye no' mind what kin' o' mon her faither was? Div ye no' ken that she has siller eneuch an' tae spare? Ma certy! she's no' like tae say as muckle tae common country-folk like you an' me, an' Rachel Simpson yonder; but onybody can see, frae the bit w'ys she has wi' her, that she's no' used tae the like o' us!"