“Do you mind telling me what you paid for it?”
“Ten guineas.”
“Was that, in your opinion, a fair price for the jacket?”
“The jacket was worth a great deal more. The price I paid for it was much below its value.”
Miss Eccleston made some further notes in her book. Then she looked up.
“Have you anything more to say, Miss Oliphant?”
“I could say more. I could make you think even worse of me than you now think, but as any further disclosures of mine would bring another girl into trouble I would rather not speak.”
“You are certainly not forced to speak. I am obliged to you for the candour with which you have treated me.”
Miss Eccleston then turned to Miss Heath, and said a few words to her in a low voice. Her words were not heard by the anxiously listening girls, but they seemed to displease Miss Heath, who shook her head; but Miss Eccleston held very firmly to her own opinion. After a pause of a few minutes, Miss Heath came forward and addressed the young girls who were assembled before her.
“The leading spirit of this college,” she said, “is almost perfect immunity from the bondage of rules. The Principals of these Halls have fully trusted the students who reside in them, and relied on their honour, their rectitude, their sense of sound principle. Hitherto we have had no reason to complain that the spirit of absolute trust which we have shown has been abused; but the circumstance which has just occurred has given Miss Eccleston and myself some pain.”