'Did you see that underbred young man following us as we came home?' asked Miss Pillby, with a disgusted air, as she shared an invigorating repast of bread and butter and toast and water with the pupils who had been to church. 'Some London shopman, no doubt, by his bad manners.' She stole a look at Ida, who flushed ever so slightly at hearing Brian Wendover thus maligned.
Fräulein Wolf slept in the room occupied by Miss Pillby and Miss Motley—three narrow iron bedsteads in a particularly inconvenient room, always devoted to governesses, and supposed to be a temple of learning.
While Miss Motley was saying her prayers, Miss Pillby wriggled up to the Fräulein, who was calmly brushing her flaxen tresses, and whispered impetuously, 'I have seen him! I know all about it!'
'Ach, Himmel,' cried the Fräulein. 'Thou wouldst not betray?'
'Not for the world.'
'Is he not handsome, godlike?' demanded the Fräulein, still in German.
'Yes, he is very nice-looking. Don't tell Palliser that I know anything about him. She mightn't like it.'
The Fräulein shook her head, and put her finger to her lips, just as Miss Motley rose from her knees, remarking that it was impossible for anybody to pray in a proper business-like manner with such whispering and chattering going on.
Next day Miss Pillby contrived to get a walk in the garden before the early dinner. Here among the asparagus beds she had a brief conversation with a small boy employed in the kitchen-garden, a youth whose mother washed for the school, and had frequent encounters with Miss Pillby, that lady having charge of the linen, and being, in the laundress's eye, a power in the establishment. Miss Pillby had furthermore been what she called 'kind' to the laundress's hope. She had insisted upon his learning his catechism, and attending church twice every Sunday, and she had knitted him a comforter, the material being that harsh and scrubby worsted which makes the word comforter a sound of derision.
Strong in the sense of these favours, Miss Pillby put it upon the boy as a duty which he owed to her and to society to watch Ida Palliser's proceedings in the river-meadow. She also promised him sixpence if he found out anything bad.