CHAPTER XV
CUPID AND COMPANY
"The curfew tolls the knell of parting day,
The lowing herd wind slowly o'er the lea——"
scanned Gyp in a singsong voice. Then she stopped abruptly; she realized that Miss Gray was not hearing a word that she was saying!
Miss Gray had asked Gyp to come to her after school. It was a glorious winter day and Gyp's friends were playing hockey on the little lake. Gyp had faced Miss Gray resentfully.
"Please scan three pages, Miss Westley," Miss Gray had said, putting a book into Gyp's hands. And now, in the middle of them, Miss Gray was staring out across the snowy slopes of the school grounds, not hearing one word, and blinking real tears from her pale-blue eyes!
Little Miss Gray, for years, had come and gone from Lincoln in such a mouse-like fashion that no one ever paid much attention to her; upon her changing classes, as an individual, she left scarcely any impression; as a teacher she was never cross, never exacting, gave little praise and less censure; she worked more like a noiseless, perfect machine than a human being.
Gyp had never noticed, until that moment, that she had blue eyes—very pretty blue eyes, fringed with long, dark lashes. No one could see them because she was nearsighted and wore big, round, shell-rimmed glasses, but now she had removed these in order to wipe her tears away. Gyp, fascinated by her discoveries, stared openly.
Gyp's heart never failed to go out to the downtrodden or oppressed, beast or human. Now she suddenly saw Millicent Gray, erstwhile teacher in Second-year English, as an appealing figure, very shabby, a pinched look on her oval-shaped face that gave the impression of hunger. Her hair would really be very pretty if she did not twist it back quite so tight. She was not nearly as old as Gyp had thought she was. And her tears were very pathetic; she was sniffing and searching in a pocket for the handkerchief that was probably in her knitting bag.
"T-that will d-do, Miss Westley," she managed to say, still searching and sniffing.