“You have not been found out yet, and you will not be—if you continue to do your best.”
Even if Miss Cass continued to do her best, however, and if by a supreme effort she brought herself finally to face the music, what must be the upshot of it all? She had no place to go to when this tragic farce was at an end. What was to become of her? The nearer she approached the abyss that yawned beneath her feet the wider and blacker it looked. In the end, as she knew only too well, that bottomless pit must devour her.
“But I will certainly find you another situation—when the time comes,” said Elfreda staunchly.
It was very well for the reckless author of the mischief to promise so boldly, but what did such a promise amount to? As far as Girlie was concerned the future appeared hopeless.
Besides, the matter had another aspect, of which the Deputy had lately been made aware. She was afraid, she was terribly afraid, that a certain peer was on the verge of proposing to her.
In the circumstances, it was a confession that Girlie felt bound to make to her principal. Humiliating the confession might be, a little demoralizing it certainly was, yet bound up in it was a sense of romance, a secret thrill of adventure. Somehow she felt bound in honor to tell Lady Elfreda what she feared was going to happen. Half shamefacedly she made her odd disclosure, and yet as she did so with many blushes, deep hesitations and some tears, it would be less than just to Girlie or to Girlie’s sex to say that pain was her dominant emotion.
As for Elfreda, when she grasped the true meaning of the disjointed, tremulous words, she was able to conceal her real feelings, whatever they might have been. In that art at least she was singularly adept. A light of humor burned in the eyes that seemed to peer into the very soul of Girlie Cass. And then an arrogant lip curled ever so slightly. She was justified, she was more than justified in what she had done! The thought seared the pride of one who as yet had hardly begun to learn her own intrinsic value in the matter-of-fact world of men and things.
So this was the measure of the man whom her parents considered good enough for her! In the sight of this Crœsus any underbred little impostor was as eligible as her authentic self. Suddenly the red light was hoisted in Elfreda’s eyes. That rubbishy little thing to be accepted at her surface value! Elfreda’s face grew hard.
“What ought I to do?” twittered poor Girlie.
The eyes of this daughter of a picturesque race altered curiously in the fragment of time that elapsed before she could bring herself to answer the question.