"I thought I'd like to have a little chat with you if you don't mind."
"I mind extremely," said Susan. "I don't want to have anything to do with you. A girl who could be so mean as to give up the Penwernians is unworthy of my notice."
"Oh, just as you please!" said Star. "I thought perhaps you would come and have cocoa with me in our boudoir; but if you don't care about it, never mind. I only wanted to tell you now that I have discovered absolutely and conclusively that it was not Christian Mitford who took the bill out of my purse."
"Oh!" said Susan, starting and turning very red. "And how did you find that out, pray?"
"Never mind how. I have found it out, and I thought I'd tell you. I don't want to say anything more just now."
Star immediately left the boudoir. Susan sat on, feeling very uncomfortable; for to be told that a certain thing had been discovered, the knowledge of which spelt ruin to her, Susan, was the reverse of quieting. She felt her head aching; her face flushed; her feet turned icy cold. She crept near to the fire, shivering all over.
"I'll be ill myself if this sort of thing goes on," she said to herself; and just then her dearest friend, Maud, walked into the boudoir.
"I thought I'd find you here," said Maud, speaking with some excitement.
She drew a chair forward and poked up the fire into a blaze.