Here indeed, as far as the East is from the West, all things were different; here, in those lovely rooms called Faith, Hope, Charity, Joy, were laughter and mirth, were games and all pleasantness. There was an intermediate room called Patience. In this room the girls as a rule remained under a very diluted form of discipline for two or even perhaps three months. During this time their hair was allowed to grow, and their uniform was changed from dull grey and white to pale blue and white.
When they entered the happy rooms above mentioned, they were altogether different from those most unhappy girls who went through Penitence and Discipline. There was no enjoyment denied to them, as long as they were good and obedient. Obedience was required, discipline was maintained, but over all the Sun of Love and Kindness shone.
In the summer they romped in the gardens and the paddocks. They forgot the dismal, the awful period when Penitence and Discipline were their portion. All went well with them, and Mrs. Faithful loved these pupils dearly. She sent them back by-and-by to their homes completely changed characters, earnest in their efforts, willing and anxious to work, with a great deal of vanity and self-conceit, the ruin of so many girls, completely knocked out of them.
Poor Miss Pinchin, as she was called—except by Dinah, who called her Joan—had the painful charge of the first breaking in of these young, wild creatures. Mrs. Faithful considered her an admirable woman for the purpose. How was it that she so signally and completely failed with Henrietta and Daisy?
Daisy was lying most dangerously ill. Henrietta was unmanageable. Maureen was expected. She might arrive at any moment. She had said in her telegram that she would come early, and the day of her arrival had dawned.
Mrs. Faithful felt terribly unhappy; she knew that if Daisy got worse, it would be her duty to wire to the Reverend Patrick O'Brien to beg of him to come immediately to see his step-daughter. Her keen eyes had perceived at a glance how ill her kinsman looked. She knew also that he did not really love these girls, who were not his own. She bitterly regretted now having yielded to her softer nature, and taken the girls into the school at all.
Well, she had done it on a condition, and the condition was agreed to. Maureen O'Brien was coming. This fact alone would have given the poor lady untold delight, but for Henrietta's intemperate and extraordinary remarks about her. She feared that Henrietta would torment the child, so high-minded and noble in nature. She resolved, however, on an expedient which she trusted might save her.
Maureen, whatever happened, must not be unhappy. She was not coming to the school as a pupil, but as a guest; Mrs. Faithful therefore resolved to have prayers half an hour earlier than usual that morning and then to give a short address to the girls—those girls who had passed through the worst stage of discipline and were thoroughly enjoying themselves at the school.
Amongst these was one called Margaret Devereux. There was also another—Evelyn Ross. They were cousins, and had been at first most troublesome, most defiant, most disobedient. They had now been four years at Felicity, and no one would recognise them for the little uncared-for wild imps whom their unhappy fathers had brought to the school, begging Jane Faithful to do what she could for them.