Mrs. Gilson turned on the instant and engaged her.
“Don’t talk nonsense!” she said. “Desire to be alone indeed! You deserve to be alone, miss, with bread and water, and the lock on the door! Oh, you may stare! But do you do now what he should have made you do a half-hour ago! And then you’ll feel a little less like a play actress! Alone indeed! Read that letter and tell me then what you think of yourself!”
Henrietta’s eyes sparkled with anger, but she fought hard for her dignity.
“I am not used to impertinence,” she said. “You forget yourself!”
“Read,” Mrs. Gilson retorted, “and say what you like then. You’ll have little stomach for saying anything,” she added in an undertone, “or I’m a Dutchman!”
Henrietta saw nothing for it but to read under protest, and she did so with a smile of contempt. In the circumstances it seemed the easier course. But alas! as she read, her pretty, angry face changed. She had that extreme delicacy of complexion which betrays the least ebb and flow of feeling: and in turn perplexity, wonder, resentment, all were painted there, and vividly. She looked up.
“To whom was this written?” she asked, her voice unsteady.
Mrs. Gilson was pitiless.
“Look at the beginning!” she answered.
The girl turned back mechanically, and read that which she had read before. But then with surprise; now with dread.