“I am so sorry,” she said, “for speaking of it. It was very thoughtless of me, for I know it must be very painful to you.”
She really felt guilty, for only the day before Mrs Wentworth had told her that Miss Forsyth had warned her never to allude to Major Winchester’s anxieties; he “could not bear them spoken of to him.”
“All the kinder of him,” Imogen had said to herself with a little thrill of pride, “to have confided in me about them,” though she had not expressed this to her mother.
There were times when Imogen’s confidence in Beatrix received a shake. Trixie was too unused to self-control of any kind to keep it up for long, even in a bad cause. And Miss Wentworth’s acting often gave opportunity for ridicule, it must be allowed. Then Mr Villars was severe and enthusiastic, and Imogen’s perfect fitness in appearance for the part assigned to her made him doubly provoked at her absolute incapacity to carry out his directions. More than once the close of a rehearsal found the poor girl all but in tears, and the sympathy she met with was often but scant.
“You do look so absurd when Mr Villars scolds you,” said Trixie, one day after one of these scenes. “If you talk in that brokenhearted voice I shall not be able to keep from laughing, I warn you, on the grand night itself.”
“You are very unkind,” said Imogen, flashing out. “I never wanted to act, and I never said I could. I have a good mind to—” But here her voice failed her. She turned away abruptly and left the room.
“She has gone to complain to her mother. You are a fool, Trixie,” said Miss Forsyth, elegantly.
“Not a bit of it. Her mother would put a stop to it, and Miss Imogen doesn’t in her heart wish that, by any means,” said Trixie.
“What a pity Rex isn’t here; it would be a part of the play for him to go to comfort her.”
“Hush!” said Mabella hastily, as Florence at that moment came in.