But eat her apple pudding Chrissie would not, and as she had really not had enough dinner for a strong, healthy child as she was, her temper was by no means at its best for afternoon lessons, and Miss Earle walked home, feeling sadly discouraged.
“I must tell Mrs Fortescue that I’m making no way with them,” she thought. “Things have gone too far. I do not see how one is to get any lasting impression on them. And yet, I am so sorry to disappoint their mother! I wonder if she is really in trouble? What would those children do if actual misfortunes came over them?”
A sort of presentiment, caused greatly, no doubt, by her sincere interest in her pupils, and anxiety about them, seemed to add to her depression.
“I wish I had heard what Roland said,” she thought. “He is a good sort of boy. Perhaps he was only trying to make the girls more considerate for their mother just now.”
Chapter Three.
Breaking Bad News.
The day I have described was a Thursday, and on Monday the children’s mother did return, as she had said. Nothing very particular had happened during the last day or two. Leila and Chrissie had gone on much as usual, sometimes good-tempered and pleasant—so long, that is to say, as there was nothing to ruffle or annoy them—but always thoughtless and heedless, quite unconcerned as to the comfort of those about them, thinking of nothing but their own wishes and amusement.
Still, on the whole, both the schoolroom and the nursery had been fairly peaceful. Miss Earle had found less fault than she might have done; she even let some small misdemeanours pass as if unnoticed, but she was grave and rather silent.