CHAPTER XI.

SCHOOL-GIRL GOSSIP.

Studies will be resumed on Tuesday, 25th inst. Such was the intimation sent out by Miss Elgin, the princ.i.p.al of the ladies' college which the girls were to attend.

Accordingly on Tuesday morning Ruth accompanied her cousin to Addison College, where she was kindly received by Miss Elgin, and introduced to several of the girls, who seemed friendly and agreeable.

The lofty s.p.a.cious schoolroom, with its comfortable seats and desks, its splendid maps and numerous modern appliances and convenient arrangements, the school library, with its rows of standard authors in uniform binding, the music-room, the pianos--in fact, the whole establishment exceeded Ruth's brightest dreams of school; and her desire for knowledge, which had somewhat lessened during her sojourn at the sea-side, seemed at once to be kindled afresh.

She answered readily the questions given to test her previously acquired knowledge, and it soon became evident that what she professed to know had been thoroughly learnt. In English studies she was p.r.o.nounced fairly proficient for her age; but in French, music, and other accomplishments she was very backward, and she found that she would have to work very hard in order to obtain a good place in her cla.s.s.

The work of the morning was so novel and interesting to Ruth, that she was quite astonished when the bell rang for recess, and the girls trooped off to an anteroom, where their tongues were unloosed and the pleasures and events of the holidays were discussed, with many other topics.

"Have you heard the news about Mr. Stanley?" asked a bright lively girl, Ethel Thompson by name, the gossip and news-monger of the school.

"No; what is it?" cried several voices.

"Well, you must keep it to yourselves, you know," she said in a confidential tone, "but he has failed, he is a bankrupt."

"Are you sure it is true?" asked one and another.

"How do you know?"

"I am sure it is quite true, for my father was talking about it last night, and of course I understood how it was that Mabel's place was vacant this morning," continued Ethel.

"Vacant! I should think it was! You don't suppose she would show her face here, do you?" exclaimed Julia Woburn. "Of course no one would take any notice of her. Only fancy the idea of being seen with a bankrupt's daughter!" she added scornfully.

"Well, it is not _her_ fault." "I suppose she could not help it," said one or two of the girls.

"If it is not her fault it is her father's, and of course it is a great disgrace to the family. I shouldn't think they would ever hold up their heads again," remarked Julia proudly.

"It is very sad." "I always thought them rich." "Mabel was never proud,"

began a chorus of voices, but the luncheon bell ringing at that moment put an end to the conversation.

The subject was not forgotten, however, and was referred to again in the afternoon, when the girls were preparing to return home.

"What do you think the Stanleys will do?" asked a girl of Ethel Thompson, who having brought the news was expected to know everything relating to her unfortunate school-fellow's family affairs.

"I don't know," replied Ethel. "Perhaps Mr. Stanley will begin business again, men do sometimes, you know; or he may go away from the town and start elsewhere."

"The best thing he can do, I consider," cried Julia. "I can't conceive how people can show themselves in a place where every one knows they have failed. I am sure I could not do it. But some persons have coa.r.s.e natures and do not feel things as much as others."

"I am quite sure that the Stanleys have feelings as keen as any of us,"

remarked a shy quiet-looking girl. "You know how sensitive poor Mabel is, and I do hope that if she comes back we shall all be kind to her and not let her know that we have ever heard about her father's misfortunes."

"That may be your opinion, Nora Ellis," said Julia, "but for my part I do not choose to a.s.sociate with a bankrupt's daughter. If she should return here, of course no one would speak to her; but I do not suppose that there is any fear of it. Miss Elgin would be making a great mistake if she were to receive Mabel Stanley, and would be ruining her school and acting against her own interests."

"I daresay Miss Elgin will do as she thinks best," retorted Ethel Thompson, sorry to have raised a storm which it was not easy to subdue.

Julia and Ruth did not reach school the following morning until nearly ten o'clock, the hour at which Miss Elgin's pupils a.s.sembled for their morning cla.s.ses.

They had scarcely entered the cloak-room before they became aware that something unusual had occurred, something which was evidently connected with the young girl standing apart from the rest, at the end of the room, and looking tearful and timid. In a moment Ruth guessed, from the scornful expression of her cousin's face, that the new-comer was Mabel Stanley who had been so freely discussed the previous day, and that the poor child had met with a very cool reception on her return to school.

Pity for the unfortunate girl, indignation at the freezing glances bestowed upon her, mingled perhaps with a vague idea of vexing Julia, caused Ruth to make a sudden resolution to befriend her; and when upon entering the schoolroom she found that their desks were side by side, she did not delay to take advantage of the fact and endeavour to set Mabel at ease by referring to her occasionally for help in little matters of school routine with which she (Ruth) was unacquainted. The questions were politely answered, but her sensitive neighbour seemed either too proud or too shy to respond to her friendly advances.

"Ruth Arnold," exclaimed Julia in the cloak-room at the close of the day, when Mabel Stanley had dressed quickly in silence and taken her departure with only a half-whispered "Good-afternoon" to Ruth, "did you know that the girl you have been sitting next all day is the very one we were talking about yesterday?"

"Yes, I imagined so," was the quiet reply.

"But I thought you knew that we had all determined to cut her if she came back, and not to say one word more to her than we were really obliged," continued Julia.

"Why?" asked Ruth sharply.

"Because she has no business here, because she degrades the school. A bankrupt's daughter ought not to come here," said Julia haughtily, "and I hope you will not a.s.sociate with her."

Ruth's eyes were flashing and her cheeks crimson as she retorted angrily, "That is no reason why I should not be friendly with her; and indeed, Julia, I do not intend to ask you whom I am to choose for my friends."

"Do as you like, and go your own way," said Julia with a scornful laugh.

"Mabel must be dest.i.tute of all fine feeling, but perhaps you have a fancy for people of that sort. If any one belonging to me had ever been a bankrupt, I should never show my face in the town again."

She left the house a moment later with one or two of her chosen friends, and Ruth was slowly walking home alone, trying to swallow her indignation, and letting the cool breeze fan her hot cheeks, when Ethel Thompson overtook her.

"I really think," she began, "that Julia has been terribly down on Mabel, and I am glad that you took her part and would not give in. Our coolness to her to-day was all Julia's doing, and I know that she is wild with you, for she cannot bear to be crossed. But Mabel has not done anything; and after all, I don't see why we should cut her to please Julia, who wants to dictate to every one."

Ruth made an indifferent reply, and hastened to change the subject, for she did not care to discuss her cousin's shortcomings with one whom she knew but slightly.

Very few words pa.s.sed between the cousins upon their return home that evening; but on their way to school the next morning Julia asked scornfully, "Do you still intend to cultivate your aristocratic acquaintance, Ruth?"

"I shall do as I please," said the other shortly.

The girls at Miss Elgin's were mostly the children of wealthy parents, but unhappily many of them, though rich and fashionable, were sadly lacking in refinement of heart and mind. Money was the G.o.d revered and worshipped in most of their homes, the one thing talked of and held in honour, and it was not surprising that the girls, from constantly hearing their neighbours' worth reckoned solely by the amount of money they possessed, had come to regard it as the chief good, and to consider the want of it as something like a crime. Julia had been reared in a somewhat different atmosphere, but she had adopted the tone of her school-fellows, and even surpa.s.sed them in scorn and disdain for those who were poor or unfortunate.

But she was about to meet with a terrible humiliation.

CHAPTER XII.

JULIA'S HUMILIATION.

A tender conscience is easily aroused, and Ruth's had been troubling her since the previous afternoon. She knew that although she had done right in befriending Mabel she had not done it in a Christian spirit. She almost decided that she ought to beg her cousin's pardon, and was even thinking what it would be advisable to say, when Julia's question stirred her worst feelings to activity, and she answered curtly that she should do as she pleased.

A lively conversation was being carried on in the cloak-room, but suddenly ceased as they entered. The exciting cause of it was Ethel Thompson, whose busy tongue often brought both herself and others into trouble. She had carried home a full account of the quarrel between the cousins the day before, and had concluded by imitating Julia's haughty manner when she said, "If any one belonging to me had ever been a bankrupt, I should never show my face in the town again."