A Sweet Girl Graduate by L. T. Meade (most read book in the world TXT) 📗

CHAPTER XXX
“IF I HAD KNOWN YOU SOONER”

As Maggie was leaving the crowded drawing-room she came face to face with Rosalind. One of those impulses which always guided her, more or less, made her stop suddenly and put her hand on the young girl’s shoulder.

“Will you come home with me?” she asked.

Rosalind was talking gaily at the moment to a very young undergraduate.

“I am obliged to you,” she began; “you are kind, but I have arranged to return to St. Benet’s with Miss Day and Miss Marsh.”

“I should like you to come now with me,” persisted Maggie in a grave voice.

Something in her tone caused Rosalind to turn pale. The sick fear, which had never been absent from her heart during the evening, became on the instant intolerable. She turned to the young lad with whom she had been flirting, bade him a hasty and indifferent “good night” and followed Maggie out of the room.

Hammond accompanied the two girls downstairs, got their cab for them and helped them in.

After Rosalind consented to come home Miss Oliphant did not address another word to her. Rosalind sat huddled up in a corner of the cab; Maggie kept the window open and looked out. The clear moonlight shone on her white face and glistened on her dress. Rosalind kept glancing at her. The guilty girl’s terror of the silent figure by her side grew greater each moment.

The girls reached Heath Hall and Maggie again touched Rosalind on her arm.

“Come to my room,” she said; “I want to say something to you.”

Without waiting for a reply she went on herself in front. Rosalind followed abjectly; she was shaking in every limb.

The moment Maggie closed her room door Rosalind flung her cloak off her shoulders, and, falling on her knees, caught the hem of Maggie’s dress and covered her face with it.

“Don’t, Rosalind; get up,” said Miss Oliphant in a tone of disgust.

“Oh, Maggie, Maggie, do be merciful! Do forgive me! Don’t send me to prison, Maggie— don’t!”

“Get off your knees at once, or I don’t know what I shall do,” replied Maggie.

Rosalind sprang to her feet; she crouched up against the door; her eyes were wide open. Maggie came and, faced her.

“Oh, don’t!” said Miss Merton with a little shriek, “don’t look at me like that!” She put up her hand to her neck and began to unfasten her coral necklace. She took it off, slipped her bracelets from her arms, took her earrings out and removed her pins.

“You can have them all,” she said, holding out the coral; “they are worth a great deal more— a great deal more than the money I— took!”

“Lay them down,” said Maggie. “Do you think I could touch that coral? Oh, Rosalind,” she added, a sudden rush of intense feeling coming into her voice, “I pity you! I pity any girl who has so base a soul.”

Rosalind began to sob freely. “You don’t know how I was tempted,” she said. “I went through a dreadful time, and you were the cause— you know you were, Maggie. You raised the price of that coral so wickedly, you excited my feelings. I felt as if there was a fiend in me. You did not want the sealskin jacket, but you bid against me and won it. Then I felt mad, and, whatever you had offered for the coral, I should have bidden higher. It was all your fault; it was you who got me into debt. I would not be in the awful, awful plight I am in to-night but for you, Maggie.”

“Hush!” said Maggie. The pupils of her eyes dilated curiously; she put her hand before them.

“The fruits of my bad half-hours,” she murmured under her breath. After a long pause, she said:

“There is some truth in your words, Rosalind; I did help you to get into this false position. I am sorry; and when I tell Miss Heath the whole circumstance— as I must to-morrow— you may be sure I shall not exonerate myself.”

“Oh, Maggie, Maggie, you won’t tell Miss Heath! If you do, I am certain to be expelled, and my mother— my mother will die; she is not over strong just now, and this will kill her. You cannot be so cruel as to kill my mother, Maggie Oliphant, particularly when you yourself got me into this.”

“I did not get you into this,” retorted Maggie. “I know I am not blameless in the matter; but could I imagine for a moment that any girl, any girl who belonged to this college, could debase herself to steal and then throw the blame on another. Nancy Banister has told me, Rose, how cruelly you spoke to Priscilla— what agony your cruel words cost her. I did wrong, I own, but no act of mine would have tempted another girl to do what you have done. Now, stop crying; I have not brought you here to discuss your wickedness with you. I shall tell the whole circumstance to Miss Heath in the morning. It is my plain duty to do so, and no words of yours can prevent me.”

With a stifled cry Rosalind Merton again fell on her knees.

“Get up,” said Maggie, “get up at once, or I shall bring Miss Heath here now. Your crime, Rosalind, is known to Miss Day and to Miss Marsh. Even without consulting Miss Heath, I think I can take it upon me to say that you had better leave St. Benet’s by the first train in the morning.”

“Oh, yes— yes! that would be much the best thing to do.”

“You are to go home, remember.”

“Yes, I will certainly go home. But, Maggie, I have no money— I have literally no money.”

“I will ask Priscilla Peel to go with you to the railway station, and I will give her sufficient money to pay your fare to London— you live in London, don’t you?”

“Yes, at Bayswater.”

“What is your address”

“19 Queen Street, Bayswater.”

“Priscilla shall telegraph to your mother, when you start, and ask her to meet you at King’s Cross.”

Rosalind’s face grew paler and paler. “What excuse am I to give to mother?” she asked.

“That is your own affair; I have no doubt you will find something to say. I should advise you, Rosalind, to tell your poor mother the truth, for she is certain to hear all about it from Miss Heath the following morning.”

“Oh, what a miserable, miserable girl I am, Maggie!”

“You are a very miserable and sinful girl; It was a wretched day for St. Benet’s when a girl such as you are came to live here. But I don’t want to speak of that now, Rosalind; there is something you must do before you leave.”

“What is that?”

“You must go to Priscilla Peel and humbly beg her pardon.”

“Oh, I cannot, I cannot! You have no idea how I hate Priscilla.”

“I am not surprised; the children of darkness generally hate those who walk in the light.”

“Maggie, I can’t beg her pardon.”

“You can please yourself about that: I certainly shall not force you; but, unless you beg Priscilla’s pardon and confess to her the wicked deed you have done, I shall lend you no money to go home. You can go to your room now, Rosalind; I am tired and wish to go to bed. You will be able to let me know your decision in the morning.”

Rosalind turned slowly away. She reached her room before the other girls had arrived home, and tossing the coral ornaments on her dressing-table, she flung herself across her bed and gave way to the most passionate, heart-broken sobs that had ever rent her baby frame.

She was still sobbing, but more quietly, for the force of her passion had exhausted her, when a very light touch on her shoulder caused her to raise herself and look up wildly. Prissie was bending over her.

“I knocked several times,” she said, “but you did not hear me, so I came in. You will be sick if you cry like this, Rose. Let me help you go to bed.”

“No, no; please don’t touch me. I don’t want you, of all people, to do anything for me.”

“I wish you would let me undress you. I have often helped Aunt Raby to go to bed when she was very tired. Come, Rose, don’t turn away from me. Why should you?”

“Priscilla, you are the last person in the world who ought to be kind to me just now; you don’t know, you can never, never guess, what I did to you.”

“Yes, I can partly guess, but I don’t want to think of it.”

“Listen, Prissie: when I stole that money, I hoped people would accuse you of the theft.”

Prissie’s eyes filled with tears. “It was a dreadful thing to do,” she said faintly.

“Oh, I knew you could never forgive me.”

“I do forgive you.”

“What! aren’t you angry? Aren’t you frantic with rage and passion?”

“I don’t wish to think of myself at all: I want to think of you. You are the one to be pitied.”

“I? Who could pity me?”

“Well, Rosalind, I do,” answered Priscilla in a slow voice; “you have sunk so low, you have done such a dreadful thing, the kind of thing that the angels in heaven would grieve over.”

“Oh, please don’t talk to me of them.”

“And then, Rosalind,” continued Prissie, “you look so unlike a girl who would do this sort of thing. I have a little sister at home— a dear, little innocent sister, and her eyes are blue like yours, and she is fair, too, as you are fair. I love her, and I think all good things of her. Rosalind, I fancy that your mother thinks good things of you. I imagine that she is proud of you, and that she loves to look at your pretty face.”

“Oh, don’t— don’t!” sobbed Rosalind. “Oh, poor mother, poor mother!” she burst into softened and sorrowful weeping. The hardness of her heart had melted for the time under the influence of Priscilla’s tender words.

“I wish I had known you sooner,” whispered Rose when Prissie bent down and kissed her before leaving her for the night. “Perhaps I might have been a good girl if I had really known you sooner, Priscilla Peel.”