“Do you mean to say, am I being educated to be a governess?” she said haughtily. “No, Miss Meredon, I am not I think before you make such remarks you might be at the trouble to understand whom you are talking to, though you seem to think yourself of a perfectly different world from every one about you. But even in our world there are such things as well-educated ladies who are not governesses, though the idea may be a new one to you.”
Claudia’s face grew pale with distress. She clasped her hands together, while her eyes filled with tears.
“Oh, dear, what have I done? How clumsy and rude I have been—just when I did so want to be the opposite,” for her poor little overture to Charlotte had been made in deference to a suggestion of her mother’s, that without infringing Lady Mildred’s rules, she might surely find some small opportunities of showing kindliness and sympathy to her companions. “I can only say I did not—oh, indeed I did not mean to offend you.”
“You have found us all sufficiently well-bred to ask you no questions, as you evidently wished to be considered a person apart; and I can’t therefore see that you, on your side, can expect any confidences,” Charlotte said icily.
“No, no, of course not,” said Claudia nervously. “But, Miss Waldron, you are forgetting—are you not going to correct that last paragraph?” for Charlotte was bundling up her books and preparing to stalk off with what she considered great dignity.
“Certainly not. I am not going to do anything so dishonourable as to correct my exercises by yours,” said Charlotte.
“Oh, it would not be that—you know it would not be that,” said Claudia sadly. “I know what is honourable and what is not so, though you will not allow that I am nice in any way, now that I have offended you. I only explained the rule to you as mademoiselle had already done. You have not seen my exercise—you don’t know what I have put.”
But it was in vain. And the result, as might have been expected, was that Claudia’s exercise was the only correct one, and that Charlotte received for the first time a sharp reprimand from the French teacher for inattention and indifference. And for the first time the praises that were lavished upon herself gave Claudia no pleasure, but instead, real pain and distress.