'I won't show it to Jacinth,' she thought. 'Aunt Alison said it was better for her not to speak about the Harpers to Lady Myrtle, so there's no use in saying anything about them. And it's more comfortable not to have something in your head you're not to tell. I suppose I must try to put it all out of my head, but it would have been nice to help to make that old aunt of theirs like them. I'll put the letter in an envelope ready addressed to mamma—that'll keep any one from touching it—and I'll send it to her in my next letter.'
But it called for some self-control not to tell it all to her sister, even at the risk of her displeasure. And Frances was conscious of a very slight feeling of relief when Jacinth, evidently in high spirits, though quiet as she always was, set off in state the next day for her visit to Robin Redbreast.
She had made up her mind to enjoy herself and to be pleased with everything, and it was not difficult to carry out this programme. Everything Lady Myrtle could think of to make her young guest feel at home had been done, and Jacinth was both quick to see this and most ready to appreciate it.
She drew a deep breath of satisfaction when she found herself seated in Lady Myrtle's comfortable brougham, which, though a trifle old-fashioned, was, like everything belonging to the Robin Redbreast establishment, thoroughly good of its kind.
'It is like being at Stannesley again,' thought Jacinth, 'only poor granny's carriage and horses, and old Simpson the coachman, weren't half so nice as all this is.'
And, to confess the truth, I think a passing regret went through her that the road to her destination lay straight out from the town on the Market Square Place side, so that there was no chance of her meeting any of her school-fellows and giving them a smiling nod of recognition.
The door was opened by the neat parlour-maid, but behind her appeared—to do special honour to the young lady, no doubt—a functionary whom Jacinth had not seen before—no less a personage than Mr Thornley, Lady Myrtle's old, not to say aged butler. He came forward gently rubbing his hands, and bending with a decorous mixture of paternal solicitude and deference which Jacinth by no means objected to, though it made her inclined to smile a little.
'Miss Mildmay, I presume?'
'Miss Mildmay' was quite equal to the occasion. She bent her head graciously.
'Her ladyship is awaiting you in her boudoir, if you will have the goodness to follow me,' the old man proceeded.