A Sweet Girl Graduate

“You’d have beheld an edifying sight then, my dear,” said Rosalind. “Prissie’s whole behaviour was one to be copied. No words can describe her tact and grace.”

“But what did she do, Rosie? I wish you would speak out and tell us. You know you are keeping something back.”

“Whenever she saw me she scolded me, and she tripped over my dress several times.”

“Oh, you dear, good, patient Rosalind, what a bore she must have been.”

“No, she wasn’t, for I scarcely saw anything of her. She amused herself capitally without me, I can tell you.”

“Amused herself? Propriety amused herself? How diverting! Could she stoop to it?”

“She did. She stooped and – conquered. She secured for herself an adorer.”

“Rosalind, how absurd you are! Poor, Plain Propriety!”

“As long as I live I shall hate the letter P,” suddenly interrupted Annie Day, “for since that disagreeable girl has got into the house we are always using it.”

“Never mind, Rosalind; go on with your story,” said Miss Jones. “What did Plain Propriety do?” Rosalind threw up her hands, rolled her eyes skywards, and uttered the terse remark —

“She flirted!”

“Oh, Rosie! who would flirt with her? I suppose she got hold of some old rusty, musty don. But then I do not suppose you’d find that sort of man at the Elliot-Smiths’.”

This remark came from Lucy Marsh. Rosalind Merton, who was leaning her fair head against a dark velvet cushion, looked as if she enjoyed the situation immensely.

“What do you say to a Senior Wrangler?” she asked, in a gentle voice.

“Rosalind, what – not the Senior Wrangler?” Rosalind nodded.

“Oh! oh! oh! what could he see – Geoffrey Hammond, of all people! He’s so exclusive, too.”

“Well,” said Hetty Jones, standing up reluctantly, for she felt it was time to return to her neglected studies, “wonders will never cease! I could not have supposed that Mr Hammond would condescend to go near the Elliot-Smiths’, and most certainly I should never have guessed that he would look at a girl like Priscilla Peel.”

“Well, he flirted with her,” said Rosalind, “and she with him. They were so delighted with one another that I could scarcely get Prissie away when it was time to leave. They looked quite engrossed – you know the kind of air – there was no mistaking it!”

“Miss Peel must have thanked you for taking her.”

“Thanked me? That’s not Miss Prissie’s style. I could see she was awfully vexed at being disturbed.”

“Well, it’s rather shabby,” said Polly Singleton, speaking for the first time. “Everyone at St. Benet’s knows to whom Mr Hammond belongs.”

“Yes, yes, of course, of course,” cried several voices.

“And Maggie has been so kind to Miss Peel,” continued Polly.

“Yes – shame! – how mean of little Propriety!” the voices echoed again.

Rosalind gave a meaning glance at Annie Day. Annie raised her eyebrows, looked interrogative, then her face subsided into a satisfied expression. She asked no further questions, but she gave Rosalind an affectionate pat on the shoulder.

Soon the other girls came up one by one to say good-night. Rosalind, Annie, and Lucy were alone. They drew their chairs together, and began to talk.

Chapter Sixteen

Pretty Little Rosalind

“I have done it now,” said Rosalind; “the estrangement will come about naturally. Propriety won’t head a party at this college, for she will not have Miss Oliphant’s support. My dear girls, we need do nothing further. The friendship we regretted is at an end.”

“Did you take Priscilla Peel to the Elliot-Smiths’ on purpose, then?” asked Miss Day.

“I took her there for my own purposes,” replied Rosalind. “I wanted to go. I could not go alone, as it is against our precious rules. It was not convenient for any of my own special friends to come with me, so I thought I’d play Prissie a nice little trick. Oh, wasn’t she angry! My dear girls, it was as good as a play to watch her face.”

Rosalind lay back in her chair and laughed heartily. Her laughter was as melodious as the sound of silver bells.

“Well,” said Miss Marsh, after a pause, “I wish you would stop laughing and go on with your story, Rose.”

Rosalind resumed her grave deportment.

“That’s all,” she said; “there’s nothing, more to tell.”

“Did you know, then, that Mr Hammond would be there?”

“No, I had not the least idea that piece of luck would fall in my way. Meta managed that for me most delightfully. You know, girls, how earnestly the poor dear Elliot-Smiths aspire, and how vain are their efforts, to get into what we are pleased to call the ‘good set’ here. It isn’t their fault, poor things, for, though they really have no talent nor the smallest literary desires, they would give their eyes to be ‘hail-fellows-well-met’ with some of our intellectual giants. Well, Meta got to know Mr Hammond at a tennis party in the summer, and when she met him last week she asked him to come to her house to-day. She told me she was dying to have him, of course, but when she asked him she could see by his face and manner that he was searching his brains for an excuse to get out of it. All of a sudden it flashed into her head to say, ‘Some of our friends from St. Benet’s will be present.’ The moment she said this he changed, and got very polite, and said he would certainly look in for a little while. Poor Meta was so delighted! You can fancy her chagrin when he devoted himself all the time to Prissie.”

“He thought he’d meet Maggie Oliphant,” said Annie Day; “it was a shame to lure him on with a falsehood. I don’t wonder at people not respecting the Elliot-Smiths.”

“My dear,” responded Rosalind, “Meta did not tell a lie. I never could have guessed that you were strait-laced, Annie.”

“Nor am I,” responded Annie, with a sigh, which she quickly suppressed.

“The whole thing fitted in admirably with our wishes,” continued Rose, “and now we need not do anything further in the matter. Rumour, in the shape of Hetty Jones’s tongue, and Polly Singleton’s hints, will do the rest for us.”

“Do you really think that Maggie Oliphant cares for Mr Hammond?” asked Lucy Marsh.

“Cares for him!” said Rosalind. “Does a duck swim? Does a baby like sweet things? Maggie is so much in love with Mr Hammond that she’s almost ill about it – there!”

“Nonsense!” exclaimed the other two girls.

“She is, I know she is. She treats him shamefully, because of some whim of hers. I only wish she may never get him.”

“He’d do nicely for you, wouldn’t he, Rose?” said Annie Day.

A delicate pink came into Rosalind’s cheeks. She rose to leave the room.

“Mr Hammond is not in my style,” she said. “Much too severe and too learned. Good-night, girls. I must look over the notes of that wretched French lecture before I go to bed.”

Rosalind sought her own room, which was in another corridor. It was late now – past eleven o’clock. The electric light had been put out. She was well supplied with candles, however, and lighting two on the mantelpiece and two on her bureau, she proceeded to stir up her fire and to make her room warm and cosy.

Rosalind still wore the pretty light silk which had given her such an elegant appearance at the Elliot-Smiths’ that afternoon. Securing the bolt of her door, she pushed aside a heavy curtain, which concealed the part of her room devoted to her wardrobe, washing apparatus, etc. Rosalind’s wardrobe had a glass door, and she could see her petite figure in it from head to foot. It was a very small figure, but exquisitely proportioned. Its owner admired it much. She turned herself round, took up a hand-glass, and surveyed herself in profile, and many other positions. Then, taking off her pretty dress, she arrayed herself in a long white muslin dressing-robe, and letting down her golden hair, combed out the glittering masses. They fell in showers below her waist. Her face looked more babyish and innocent than ever as it smiled to its own fair image in the glass.