“Forgive! I wouldn’t like to be in Betty’s shoes.” Penelope went slowly upstairs.
“Now do hurry; the carriage will be at the door in twenty minutes. And, Pen, do change your dress. We may meet smart people going to Whitby, we may indeed.”
Pen turned an angle in the staircase. She walked more and more slowly. Clara’s words kept echoing in her brain. “Father would half kill anybody who had done this. She wouldn’t like to be in Betty’s shoes.” Pen went straight into Jim’s room. When she had shut the door, she said aloud:
“You might have helped me out of this awful mess; oh, you might, I wrote you such a distracted letter. Oh, I can’t see Betty. I can’t, I can’t! Oh, what am I to do? Well, I won’t go to Whitby, on that point I have quite made up my mind.”
Before her resolution could falter she ran downstairs again.
“My dear Pen, not ready yet?” said Mabel, who was now in the hall.
“No, I’m not, and what is more, I’m not going.”
“Not going, Penelope? Not going?”
“No, I’m not well, and I’m not going.”
“You do look hot, we all noticed it this morning; but you are not so bad as all that.”