"Give it to me, Hester!" She held out her hand imperiously.
"Mayn't I know even who it is?" asked Hester, as she unwillingly returned it. In the act she caught the inscription and her face kindled.
Impetuously throwing herself down beside Miss Puttenham, the girl looked up at her with an expression half mockery, half sweetness, while Alice, with unsteady fingers, replaced the case and locked the drawer.
"What an awfully handsome fellow!" said Hester in a low voice, "though you wouldn't let me see it properly. I say, Auntie, won't you tell me—?"
"Tell you what?"
"Who he was—and why I never saw it before? I thought I knew all your things by heart—and now you've been keeping something from me!" The girl's tone had changed to one of curious resentment. "You know how you scold me when you think I've got a secret."
"That is quite different, Hester."
Miss Puttenham tried to rise, but Hester, who was leaning against her knee, prevented it.
"Why is it different?" she said, audaciously. "You always say you—you—want to be everything to me—and then you hide things from me—and I—"
She raised herself, sitting upright on the floor, her hands round her knees, and spoke with extraordinary animation and sparkling eyes.