"You know what it will mean if you tell?"
Ruth's grave eyes were fixed on Mrs. Hopkins's face.
"Child, I don't want to doubt you—nobody who knows you could do that—but it will mean ruin to poor Susy and to many and many a girl at the Great Shirley School. It isn't so much Miss O'Hara we mean. Miss O'Hara has gone into this with her eyes open; and she is rich, and what is disgrace to her in this little part of England, when she herself lives in a great big castle in Ireland, and is a queen, lady, and all the rest? But it means—oh, such a
frightful lot to so many! Now, Susy, for instance. I meant to apprentice her to a good trade when she had gone through her course of work at the Great Shirley; but she will have to be a servant—a little maid-of-all-work—and I think that it would break my heart if she was expelled."
"And what do you want me to do, Mrs. Hopkins?"
"Oh, my dear, not to think of yourself, but of the many who will be ruined—not to tell, Ruth Craven."
Ruth gave a gentle smile; then she put out her small slim hand and touched Mrs. Hopkins, and then turned and continued her walk to the school.
There were a group of foundationers standing round the entrance. Ruth longed to avoid them, but they saw her and clustered round her, and each and all began to whisper in her ears:
"You will be faithful, Ruth; nothing will induce you to tell. It will be hard on you, but you won't ruin so many of us. It is better for one to suffer than for all to suffer. You won't tell, will you, Ruth?"
Ruth made no reply in words. The great bell rang, the doors of the school were flung wide, and the girls, Ruth amongst them, entered.