Part 62 (2/2)
”Yes,” said Beth, ”I saw him.”
Miss Clifford let the letter fall on her lap, and Miss Bey dropped into a chair. Beth looked on with interest, and wondered about that accurate description of herself; she would have given anything to see it.
”What were you doing there?” Miss Clifford asked; and Beth noticed that she was treating the matter just as her mother had treated the menagerie business.
”Just looking at the water,” Beth said.
”At two o'clock in the morning! How did you get out?”
”By the conservatory window.”
”Had you been out before?”
”Oh yes, often.”
”Do any of the other girls go out?”
”Not that I know of,” said Beth, then added, ”No, I'm sure they don't.”
”Thank Heaven for that, at all events!” Miss Clifford e.j.a.c.u.l.a.t.ed. Then she made Beth sit down beside her, and took her hand, and gazed at her long and sorrowfully.
”Was it such a very dreadful thing to do?” Beth asked at last.
”You have been a great disappointment to me, Beth,” Miss Clifford answered indirectly, ”and to Miss Bey. We expected more of you than of any other girl now in the school--you promised so well in many ways at one time.”
”_Did I?_” said Beth, looking from one to the other in consternation.
”Oh, why didn't you tell me? I thought you all fancied I should never do anything well, and that disheartened me. If I had known----” She burst into tears.
Late that night Miss Clifford and Miss Bey sat together discussing Beth.
”I feel more than ever convinced there is something exceptional about the child,” Miss Clifford declared. ”I hope it is not insanity; but, at all events, it is not sin, and I won't have her punished. I say now what I said at first, she should have been sent here early, or not at all. And now she must go.”
”What, expel her!” Miss Bey e.j.a.c.u.l.a.t.ed.
”No. Didn't I say I would not have her punished? There is some explanation of her wild escapade besides mere naughtiness, I feel sure, and she shall have every chance that I can give her. There is no vice in her of any kind that I can discover, and she is fearlessly honest. If she were grown-up we should call her eccentric, and be interested and amused by her vagaries; and I do not see why she should not be allowed the same excuse as it is, only St. Catherine's is not the place for her. Here all must move in the common orbit, to save confusion. So I shall write to her mother, and get her to take her from the school at the end of the term in the regular way.”
”But in the meantime?” Miss Bey asked.
”Beth has given me her word that she will be good, and do nothing I should disapprove of, and she will keep it.”
So Beth's credit was saved by the good judgment of this kind, wise woman, and her career at St Catherine's ended honourably, if somewhat abruptly.
CHAPTER x.x.xIII
When it was rumoured amongst the mistresses that Beth was to leave that term, Old Tom put her on to play first piano in the first-cla.s.s solo, and to lead the treble in the second-cla.s.s duet at the examination.
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