"Let me help you," and Priscilla rushed over to Martine's side, but between them they only managed to pull drawer and contents to the floor.
"There, I will leave you to yourself, Prissie," said Martine; "you are better than I at straightening things out. I am going out to the dining-room to speak to Angelina."
As Priscilla carefully replaced the scattered contents of the drawer she refrained from looking at the letters and other papers that lay before her. She acted thus from habit rather than because she thought there was any need of this carefulness just now. She had not come upon the drawer by accident, and therefore she was at liberty to look at anything that attracted her attention. Just as Priscilla's own reflections had taken this turn, she allowed her eye to rest on a half sheet of foolscap that she had last picked up. The handwriting upon it was not Martine's, and almost without realizing what she was doing, she began to read a sentence or two. Then somewhat startled, she folded the paper, and quickly put it back in the drawer.
"Oh, I wish I hadn't seen it!" she thought. "It was Lucian's handwriting, and yet it seemed to be an outline of Martine's essay. I wonder if he wrote it for her. They say he does so well in English. I wish I hadn't seen it. It doesn't seem like Martine."
Priscilla was genuinely distressed, and when Martine returned, her feeling had taken the form of embarrassment. When Martine spoke to her, she replied with hesitation, and her manner had some of its old awkwardness.
"There," exclaimed Martine, with some acrimony, "you are really rather provoking. Here I have been telephoning and planning a good time for you, and you begin to seem as icebergy as you seemed at Yarmouth last summer. Now listen, first of all I have apologized to your aunt by telephone."
"Oh, Martine!"
"Yes, and she says it's all right, and she has forgiven me on condition that I never disturb Julius Cæsar again. It was really very good of her, when you consider that she couldn't see my blushes of repentance. So that is settled. Secondly, you are to stay here for dinner, and go with us to a recital this evening."
"A recital, and who is 'us'?"
"Oh, Lucian, and Robert, and me, or 'I,' whichever is most grammatical. As to the recital, why, haven't you heard that Angelina intends to distinguish herself in elocution? All her little surplus goes for voice-training, and things of that kind—and her recital's to-night. I should have invited you before, only you have been so high and mighty all the week."