"Well, suppose I were to help you," said Carrie, after a time.

"You, Carrie; how could you?"

"But suppose I were to--I am not the sort of person who does anything for nothing. What would you give me if I got you out of this?"

"But how could you get me out of it?"

"Why, I suppose by giving Kitty the money."

"Carrie, you talk nonsense. Unless, indeed, you were to persuade Sam Raynes----"

"Oh, it's useless to worry poor Sam. He has speculated with that money, and if he doubles it we shall have it back. I think when that time comes the very least you ought to do, Elma is to give me half of the balance over and above what you borrowed. That would be three pounds ten, for me quite a nice little sum. It would keep me in ribbons, gloves, and boots for a bit. I get such a very small salary."

"Well, the money has not been doubled; it's time enough to talk of our chickens when they are hatched," said Elma. She rose from her seat, looking despairingly at the open letter which she held in her hand.

"After all, I may as well take this up to mother," she said.

"One moment before you go, Elma. Would you like me to help you, or would you not?"

"If you could help me, Carrie, of course I should be obliged."

"And what is the punishment they have inflicted upon that Irish la.s.s?"

"Oh, dear me, Carrie, I told you all about that yesterday; she is in Coventry--we are none of us allowed to speak to her."

"All the same, you did speak to her last night, don't forget."

"Yes, I could not help myself; but if it was found out it would go hard with us both."

"Then I am the one to interfere," said Carrie _sotto voce._ "I'll do my best, Elma, and trust to you to make it up to me when I have got you out of this sc.r.a.pe."

"I wish you would do something, Carrie; but I don't suppose you can.

It's awful to think of Aunt Charlotte coming now. If I can't help Kitty, Kitty is sure to tell, and then it will be all over the school. They won't blame her so much as they'll blame me. Oh dear, dear! if you would do something!"

"Well, I promise that I just will," said Carrie. "Now go off to school with an easy mind."

CHAPTER XIX.

KITTY TELLS THE TRUTH.

Early the next morning Kitty received her telegram. It certainly was not at all calculated to soothe her. She was restless and miserable before; now her hands shook so violently that she could scarcely eat her breakfast.

Alice acted somewhat the part of a jailer; she had to convey the disgraced girl to Middleton School.

"I am ill; I won't go," said Kitty, bursting into tears.

"You had much better come, Kitty," said Alice, speaking almost kindly for the first time in her life; she really pitied poor Kitty at that moment. "If you will only take your punishment patiently it will soon be over, and I know for a fact," she continued, "that many of the girls are only too anxious to make it up to you by and by."

"Oh, it's not that," said Kitty; "it is because I am so wretched. I have a great trouble at home; but there, there's no use in talking to you about it, Alice."

"So you always say," answered Alice. "Whenever I want to be the least bit good to you, you put me off; but never mind, I am sure I can do without your friendship. Anyhow, I think you must come to school unless you are so ill that mother will be obliged to send for the doctor."

"Oh, I don't want that," said Kitty, "I never had a doctor in my life.

If you'll wait for me, Alice, I'll go upstairs and put on my hat."

She rushed to her room, flung herself on her knees for a moment by her bedside, and uttered a frantic prayer to Heaven.

"Oh! G.o.d, in your mercy, keep Laurie from doing anything desperate,"

cried the unhappy girl. She then joined Alice downstairs. Her face was white; there were heavy black lines under her eyes; she had never looked prettier, more pathetic, more likely to win sympathy from the other girls.

At prayers that morning all eyes were directed to Kitty Malone. She was not allowed to sit with the others, but was given, a place on the bench with the teachers. Here she faced the rest of the school. It would have been a cruel position for another girl; but it did not matter to Kitty, for she saw no one present. Her eyes, with that queer inward look in them, were gazing straight, not at the scene before her, but at the old home in Ireland. The squire, whom she so pa.s.sionately loved, roused to the last extremity of anger; the boy, whose heart was hers, crushed, trapped, imprisoned, his liberty taken from him. Kitty trembled from head to foot; she could scarcely restrain her terrible emotion.

After school she accompanied the others to the cla.s.sroom, but in absolute silence. She was given her usual lessons to do, but at a table by herself. Her punishment was to be carried out in all its fullness; but, dreadful as it would seem to most, it did not touch her at all to-day. Her head ached, her eyes felt dim. Laurie's telegram, which lay in her pocket, seemed to scorch into the very depths of her heart. She had not even been allowed to answer it; the whole weight of her trouble lay unrelieved upon her. The poor child was unaccustomed to such anguish, and her self-control was in danger moment by moment of giving way.

As she strove to get that dull piece of English history into her head, as she endeavored to follow the rules of syntax, as the knowledge that she never, never to the longest day of her life, would understand what was meant by the possessive case, alongside with these feeble little efforts to follow her lessons, ran the dark thought of how, by what possible means, she could help Laurie. And more and more as the time went on she felt that she could not keep her promise to Elma. Elma had been cruel to her; she had borrowed her money when she knew she had not the most remote chance of paying it back; she had spent it according to her own saying in the most frivolous way. Now, for the first time, Kitty learned to despise dress. How could Elma spend the money which was to save Laurie in anything so contemptible as ribbons and finery? Kitty looked down at her own neatly-appointed clothes; her perfect little shoes peeped out from beneath the frill of her dress. Notwithstanding her misery she was as neat as usual in her attire; but now she had no heart to appreciate gay clothes, good looks, pretty ribbons--any of the things which usually delighted her. Laurie seemed to cry to her; she fancied she could hear his voice coming across the waters to her ears--Laurie, who had always trusted to her, who, strong as he was, was not quite so strong as Kitty when sc.r.a.pes and troubles were about. Oh!

if only she could go to him! If only she might relieve her feelings and tell the exact truth to Miss Sherrard! What kept her back? Nothing whatever but the thought of Elma. She had given Elma a promise, and, tempted as she was, she must not break it.

As this thought came to her she remembered that she had only promised Elma to keep the secret until after morning school. That time would soon be up.

"Once Miss Sherrard knows I am certain she will help me," thought Kitty, "though I don't want to excuse myself; yet I know that a great deal of the blame of my proceedings will be lifted from my shoulders to Elma's.

Why should I go through all the suffering, and Elma sit there looking so calm, and quiet, and still?"

As these thoughts rushed through Kitty's mind she glanced up for the first time, and calmly surveyed the great room full of her fellow-students. As if with one impulse all the girls raised their eyes and looked back at her. There was pity on most of the faces, amus.e.m.e.nt on a few, curiosity on a few others; but on Elma's face alone was an expression of intense anxiety and misery. Kitty had the kindest heart in the world. The moment she saw this expression the idea of betraying Elma melted from her mind.

"She does look wretched," she said to herself. "I must not speak to her; I dare not, and yet--yet--I should like her to know that I am not going to be hard on her."

Kitty tore off a piece of her exercise book and managed, when she thought no one would see, to write a little note to Elma. In this she said, "Don't be afraid, Elma; I have made up my mind not to tell."

This note she twisted up, and, as the girls were going to the playground for recess, managed to flash an intelligent glance toward Elma. Elma approached close to her table, Kitty stretched out her hand, and Elma's fingers were just about to close over the note, when, by an unlucky chance, there came a breeze through the window, and the note, for some inconceivable reason, fluttered from Kitty's hand to the floor. In an instant Miss Worrick had seen it. She was just stepping forward when Elma like a flash caught it up and tore it into fragments. She would not for the world have the note seen. Miss Worrick, filled with anger, came up to Kitty.

"You are a bad girl, the worst girl I know," she said. "You are not even honorable. Did you not give your parole that you would not hold communication with another girl in the school, and yet you have been trying to communicate with Elma Lewis by means of writing?"

"Writing is not speaking," said Kitty, now standing up very erect and proud, and replying to Miss Worrick as pertly as she could.

"Don't answer me, miss; you grow worse and worse. Elma Lewis, do you know anything about that note?"

Kitty looked full at Elma. If she was going to be true to Elma, would Elma be equally true to her?"

"I know nothing about it," said Elma promptly.

Kitty's eyes filled with withering scorn; an expression of disdain curled her pretty lips.

"You are quite certain, Elma? Kitty Malone seems to have a great anxiety to communicate with you. Can you throw any light on the sc.r.a.pe she has got into?"

"I know nothing whatever about her secrets; I--I have nothing to do with them," said Elma in an agitated voice, which she endeavored in vain to render calm.