“My dear, of course I don’t mean what I say, but I can’t help seeing the whole picture: you, so fine and so self-conscious, and so—so perfect in all your appointments—and looking—for all you are a little thing, Rose—a good inch above everyone else—and then our poor, good-natured, downright Polly catching sight of her unpaid-for ornaments round your sweet baby throat—all the John Bull in her instantly coming to the fore, and she demanding her rights in no measured terms. Oh, your face, Rosie! your face! and Meta Elliot-Smith’s enjoyment—oh, how delicious the picture is! Dear Rosalind, do wear the coral, and please—please get me an invitation to the Elliot-Smiths’. I’ll love you all my life if you give me leave to witness so lovely a spectacle!”
Miss Merton’s face changed colour several times while Annie Day was speaking. She clenched her small hands, and tried hard to keep back such a torrent of angry words as would have severed this so-called friendship once and for all; but Rose’s sense of prudence was greater even now than her angry passions. Miss Day was a useful ally—a dangerous foe.
With a forced laugh, which concealed none of her real feelings, she stood up and prepared to leave the room.
“You are very witty at my expense, Annie,” she said. Her lips trembled. She found herself the next moment alone in the brightly lighted corridor.
It was over a week now since the beginning of the term; lectures were once more in full swing, and all the inmates of St. Benet’s were trying, each after her kind, for the several prizes which the life they were leading held out to them. Girls of all kinds were living under these roofs—the idle as well as the busy. Both the clever and the stupid were here, both the good and the bad. Rosalind Merton was a fairly clever girl. She had that smart sort of cleverness which often passes for wide knowledge. She was liked by many of her girl-friends; she had the character of being rather good-natured; her pretty face and innocent manner, too, helped to win her golden opinions among the lecturers and dons.
Those who knew her well soon detected her want of sincerity; but then it was Rose’s endeavour to prevent many people becoming intimately acquainted with her. She had all the caution which accompanies a deceitful character, and had little doubt that she could pursue those pettinesses in which her soul delighted, and yet retain a position as a good, innocent, and fairly clever girl before the heads of the college.
Rose generally kept her angry passions in check, but, although she had managed not to betray herself while in Miss Day’s room, now as she stood alone in the brilliantly lighted corridor, she simply danced with rage. Her small hands were clenched until the nails pierced the flesh, and her delicately coloured face became livid with passion.
At that moment she hated Annie Day—she hated Polly Singleton—she hated, perhaps, most of all Maggie Oliphant.
She walked down the corridor, her heart beating fast. Her own room was on another floor; to reach it she had to pass Miss Peel’s and Miss Oliphant’s rooms. As Rose was walking slowly down the corridor, she saw a girl come out of Miss Oliphant’s room, turn quickly in the opposite direction to the one from which she was coming, and, quickening her pace to a run, disappear from view. Rose recognised this girl: she was Priscilla Peel. Rose hastened her own steps, and peeped into Maggie’s room. To her surprise, it was empty; the door had swung wide open, and the excited, perturbed girl could see into every corner. Scarcely knowing why she did it, she entered the room. Maggie’s room was acknowledged to be one of the most beautiful in the college, and Rose said to herself that she was glad to have an opportunity to examine it unobserved.
She went and stood on the hearthrug and gazed around her; then she walked over to the bureau. Some Greek books were lying open here—also a pile of manuscript, several note-books, a few envelopes, and sheets of letter-paper. Still scarcely knowing why, Rose lifted the note-paper, and looked under it. The heap of paper concealed a purse.