Mademoiselle was very restless. She had confided a little bit of her interview with Penelope to Mrs Dawson, and Mrs Dawson had much approved of what the Frenchwoman had done. The fact is, these two women had, more or less, sketched out a future together on the strength of the twenty pounds which Penelope would give as hush money with regard to the lost bangle.
“I will keep the bangle too,” said Mademoiselle. “It would not be at all safe to give it to either of the Carlton girls. You shall wear it sometimes, and I will wear it sometimes, and we might take the house next door to this, and do a thriving business next season.”
Mrs Dawson said once, in a feeble sort of way: “Isn’t it very wicked, though?”
“Wicked?” cried Mademoiselle, “when the poor have to live!” She held up her hands in expostulation. “Ah, Madame!” she said, “trust to me in this matter. I have been treated in the way the most cruel, and this is my small, my very small revenge.”
Mrs Dawson was fascinated, but even still not quite convinced. Brenda, meanwhile, knew nothing of that sword of Damocles which was hanging over her devoted head. Strange as it may seem, she had not looked at the bangle on the previous night, and none of the girls dared to tell her what had occurred. She was very cross, and exceedingly disappointed. Her hopes had fallen through. Her little money was largely spent—all to no effect. The holidays would, all too quickly, go by, and there was nothing before her but a dreary and most monotonous existence at the Reverend Josiah Amberley’s, with her very stupid pupils as companions.
As to Harry, of course he was hopeless. She would not have looked at him again. A merchant prince, indeed! He was nothing but the son of a fifth-rate tradesman. This fact accounted for his atrocious manners and for all his many delinquencies. Certainly Brenda was in the worst of humours, and the three little girls were by no means comfortable in her presence.
She was in her room on the following morning, and the girls were there too. They were there during the moment when she would discover that the valuable bangle had been changed, and were anxious to hurry her off to the seashore.
“Let’s come, and be quick,” said Nina. “What’s the good of being at the seaside if we’re not out enjoying the air? Dear papa will be vexed if we tell him that we have spent half our time in this poky, horrid room.”
“I wonder,” said Brenda, in response, “that a little girl dares to utter such untruths. And where’s your notebook, Nina? Out with it, this minute!”
Nina coloured and then turned pale.