The heiress of McGregor

by Lucy Ellen Guernsey

"That is right, and very neatly done," said Miss Oliver. "Marion, my dear, why won't you always give me the pleasure of praising you?"

Marion looked down and played with her watch-chain.

"There is not a girl in the school with better abilities than yourself," continued Miss Oliver, "nor one who can, if she chooses, make herself more agreeable, and yet there is hardly one of your age who does not stand better than yourself. Why is it?"

Marion murmured that she didn't know how it was.

"I think I know," said Miss Oliver: "it is because you do not take pains. Your mind is not on your work. I often see you sitting with a book before you and looking out of the window for half an hour together. I do not pretend to know what you are thinking of at such times, but certainly your thoughts are not where they ought to be—on your present duties.

"You are losing two very precious things, my child, time and opportunity—two things which, once lost, can be found no more in this world, no more, perhaps, in the whole universe. You are abusing the kindness of your grandfather, who keeps you at school, you are a constant worry and annoyance to me, you set a bad example to the others, you help to lower the character of the school, and you are ruining your own. Now, what am I to do with you?"

Miss Oliver paused a moment, and then went on more gravely still:

"I can tell you what I shall do, Marion: there are two months more remaining of this term. I shall give you those two months in which to turn over a new leaf. If I do not see a very marked improvement at the end of that time, I shall lay the matter before the trustees and ask them to remove you from the school. It will grieve me to the heart to take this course on your own account, and still more on that of your friends, but I shall certainly do it."

Never in all her life had Marion been so utterly mortified and humiliated. She was crushed not only by the weight of the blow, but by its entire unexpectedness. She had somehow gone on flattering herself that she was a favourite with Miss Oliver and a person of great consequence in the school, and the thought that she could be expelled never entered her mind. But she knew that Miss Oliver was a woman of her word, and that her representation was all powerful with the trustees of the little endowed school. Oh, if she should be expelled, what a dreadful disgrace it would be!

Marion would have liked to escape to her usual refuge of considering herself persecuted, but it would not do. Conscience was aroused, and forced her to look the matter steadily in the face. She dared not accuse Miss Oliver of injustice; she knew it was all true. For the last year and more she had been steadily falling behindhand in her lessons; she had evaded her duties all she possibly could; and even when she had learned a lesson, it made no permanent impression, but had passed through her mind like water through a sieve, because she bestowed no after-thought upon it. If there was a puzzle in the arithmetic or algebra lesson or a hard line in Virgil, Kitty Tremaine, Lizzie Gates, and Julia Parmalee, and some others, would very likely get together after school and find a real pleasure in disentangling the hard knot.