But Bertha was clever and outwardly amiable. She performed her duties with exactitude and despatch. She kept the younger girls in order, and was apparently very unselfish and willing to oblige, and Mrs. Clavering, after the first week or fortnight, ceased to feel apprehensive when she looked at her face. For Bertha's face bore the impress of a somewhat crooked mind. The small light blue eyes had a sly gleam in them; they were incapable of looking one straight in the face. Bertha had the fair complexion which often accompanies a certain shade of red hair, and but for the expression in her eyes she might have been a fairly good-looking girl. She had an upright trim figure, and dressed herself neatly. Those watchful eyes, however, marred the entire face. They were as clever as they were sharp and knowing. Nothing escaped her mental vision. She could read character like a book.
Now, Bertha Keys was very poor. In her whole future life she had nothing to look forward to except what she could win by her own individual exertions. Bertha's apparent lot in life was to be a teacher—her own wish was to cringe to those in power, to obtain a footing amongst those who were likely to aid her, and she had not been a week in the school before she made up her mind that of all the girls at Cherry Court School no one was so likely to help her in the future as Florence Aylmer. If Florence won the Scholarship and became the adopted heiress of a rich aunt, the opportunities in favor of Bertha's advancement would be enormous. On the other hand, if Mary Bateman won the Scholarship nothing at all would happen to further Bertha's interest. The same might be said with regard to Kitty Sharston. Bertha, therefore, who was extremely sharp herself and thoroughly well educated, determined that she would not leave a stone unturned to help Florence with regard to the Scholarship. Nothing was said on the subject between Florence and Bertha for several weeks. Bertha never failed, however, to propitiate Florence, helping her when she could with her work, doing a thousand little nameless kindnesses for her, and giving her, when the opportunity offered, many sympathetic glances. She managed to glean from the younger girls something of Florence's history, noted when those long letters came from Mrs. Aylmer the great, observed how depressed Florence was when she received letters from Dawlish, noted her feverish anxiety to deport herself well, to lead a life of excellent conduct, and, above all things, to struggle through the weighty themes which had to be mastered in order to win the great Scholarship.
One day about three weeks before the Scholarship examination was to take place, and a week after the events related in the last chapter, Florence was engaged in reading a long letter from her Aunt Susan. Mrs. Aylmer had received her invitation to Cherry Court Park, and had written to her niece on the subject.
"I shall arrive the day before the Scholarship examination," she wrote, "and, my dear girl, will bring with me a dress suitable for you to wear on the great day. I have consulted my dressmaker, Madame le Rouge, and she suggests white bengaline, simply made and suitable to a young girl. Yours, my dear Florence, will be the simplest dress in the school, and yet far and away the most elegant, for what we have to aim at now is the extreme simplicity of graceful youth. Nothing costs more than simplicity, my dear girl, as you will discover presently. But more of that when we meet. One last word, dear Florence; of course, you will not fail. Were I to see you dishonored, I should never hold up my head again, and, as far as you are concerned, would wash my hands of you forever."
Florence's lips trembled as she read the last words. An unopened letter from her mother lay on her lap. She flung down Mrs. Aylmer's letter and took up her mother's. She had just broken the envelope and was preparing to read it when Dolly Fairfax rushed into the room.
"Florence, do come out for one moment," she said; "Edith wants to tell you something."
"Oh, I can't go; I am busy," said Florence, restlessly.
"I wish you would come; it is something important; it is something about to-night. Do come; Edith would come to you, but she is looking after two or three of the little ones in the cherry orchard. You can go back in five minutes."
Uttering a hasty exclamation, and thrusting her mother's letter into her pocket, Florence started up and followed Dolly. She forgot all about her aunt's letter, which had fallen to the floor.
She had scarcely left the room before Bertha Keys stepped forward, picked up the letter, read it from end to end, and having done so laid it back on Florence's desk. Florence returned presently, sat down by her desk, and, taking her mother's letter out of her pocket, read it.