“Your statement, miss, is satisfactory, as far as it goes. We will therefore, being assured by our own experience that you are right, lend Miss Lushington the required sum, but on the distinct understanding that if Lady Lushington raises any question with regard to the account, we are at liberty to mention your name in the matter.”
“How so?” asked Annie, very much alarmed. “I am only a little schoolgirl,” she added, “with no money at all.”
“Nevertheless, miss, we must mention your name—Miss Annie Brooke, is it not?”
Annie nodded. Mrs Priestley made a note of it, adding the date of Annie’s visit and the fact that she was a resident at Lyttelton School. She then, without any further ado, produced gold and notes to the amount of thirty pounds, which she folded up into a little parcel and gave to Annie.
“You will give us a receipt for this, miss,” she said; and Annie did so in due form. “And now, miss,” continued the woman, “all is well, and you will never hear any more with regard to this matter if we are paid our account in full; but if there is difficulty—and even rich ladies sometimes grumble at a bill such as we shall be forced to produce—then you may get into hot water. We will now wish you good-afternoon, miss, for our time is not our own but our customers’.”
How flushed Annie was! When she got into the open air she panted slightly. She looked up the street and down the street. She had had an awful time with Mrs Priestley, and she had quite forgotten the dress which was to be made for Mabel. She could not remedy that omission now, however; for nothing would induce her to see the terrible Mrs Priestley again. Her companions were not yet in sight, and she paced up and down thinking her own thoughts.
After a time she felt calmer. The money was safe in her pocket. There would be no fuss for three months at least. Annie was a sort of girl who could not think of trouble three months ahead. In half-an-hour she felt quite happy. The memory of her depression vanished, and when the girls on their bicycles hove in sight she met them with a gay word.
“You have had a ride!” she said. “I have been out of Mrs Priestley’s for ages.”
“I thought,” said Agnes Moore, one of the girls, “that you would never be tired of an interview with a dressmaker, Annie. Is she quite as imposing as people describe her? I go to Mrs Arnold, you know.”
“She is withering,” said Annie, with a laugh. “She invariably speaks of herself as ‘we,’ and is a perfect mass of pomposity. I do wish, Agnes, you could have heard the withering tone in which she alluded to ‘Mrs Arnold’s ladies.’ Oh dear, oh dear! I nearly died with laughter.” During the rest of the ride home Annie amused herself in taking off Mrs Priestley, which she did to the life. That very same evening thirty pounds in gold and notes had been transferred, first from Annie’s pocket to that of Mabel Lushington, and then from Mabel Lushington to Priscilla Weir.