The Making of a Prig Part 21

"Yes?" said Katharine, smiling. "Do you want anything?"

"Oh, no," said Phyllis, and crept away again. Katharine sat and pondered a little while longer. Presently, she shivered and made the discovery that she was cold, and she jumped up and stretched herself.

"I suppose I must unpack," she said, still smiling contentedly. "Where has Phyllis gone, I wonder?"

She went to the door and made the pa.s.sage ring with her voice, until Phyllis hurried out of a neighbouring room and apologised for not being there when she was wanted.

"I believe you were there when I didn't want you," said Katharine candidly. "Wasn't I cross to you or something?" Her foot touched one of the discarded Chinese lanterns.

"Hullo! I thought there were some lanterns somewhere. Where are they gone?"

"Oh, no!" said Phyllis, going down on her knees before the box. "You must have been dreaming."

"I wasn't dreaming, and you're a foolish old dear, and I am a selfish pig," cried Katharine penitently.

"Oh, no!" said Phyllis again. "I was the pig, you see, because I forgot your letter. You'll rumple my hair, if you do that again."

Katharine did hug her again, nevertheless, and accused herself of all the offences she could remember, whether they related to the present occasion or not; and Phyllis silenced her in a gruff voice, and the unpacking proceeded by degrees.

"Don't you think," said Katharine irrelevantly, "that women are much more selfish than men, in some ways?"

"What ways?"

"I mean when they are absorbed in anything. Now, a man wouldn't behave like a cad to his best friend, just because he happened to be in love with a girl, would he? But a woman would. She would betray her nearest and dearest for the sake of a man. I am certain I should. Women are so wolfish, directly they feel things; and they seem to lose their sense of honour when they fall in love. Don't they?"

"Where do the stockings go?" was all Phyllis said.

"Perhaps," continued Katharine, "it is because a woman really has stronger feelings than a man."

"I shouldn't wonder," said Phyllis. "Who packed the sponge bag next to your best hat?"

"I don't think it matters," said Katharine mildly. "I was saying-- What are you laughing at?"

"Nothing. Only, it is so delightful to have you back again, moralising away while I do all the work," laughed Phyllis.

Katharine owned humbly that Phyllis always did all the work, and Phyllis bluntly repudiated the charge, and insisted that Katharine was the most unselfish person in the world, and Katharine ended in allowing herself to be persuaded that she was; and the rest of the evening pa.s.sed in an amicable exchange of news. Even the "cat in the pie dish" seemed appetising that evening.

Her feeling of satisfaction was increased when she arrived at school the next morning and found that Mrs. Downing was anxious to speak to her. An interview with the lady princ.i.p.al at the beginning of term generally foreboded some good.

"I want you to give up the junior teaching this term, my dear Miss Austen," she began, after greeting her warmly. "You are really too good for it, far too good. Mr. Wilton was quite right when he told me how cultured you were, quite right. At the time, I must confess to feeling very doubtful; you seemed so inexperienced,--so very young, in fact. But I have come to think that in your case it is no drawback to be young; indeed, the dear children seem to prefer it. Their attachment for you is extraordinary; pardon me, I should have said phenomenal. And the way you manage them is perfect, quite perfect,--just the touch of firmness to show that your kindness is not weakness. Admirable! I am most grateful to Mr. Wilton for introducing you to me, most grateful. Such a charming man, is he not? So distinguished!"

She paused for breath, and Katharine murmured an acknowledgment of Mr.

Wilton's distinction.

"To come to the point, my dear Miss Austen, I should be charmed, quite charmed, if you would take the senior work this term,--English in all its branches, French translation, Latin, and drawing. I think you know the curriculum, do you not? Thank you very much; that is so good of you! Did you have a pleasant holiday? There is no need to ask how you are,--the very picture of health, I am sure! And the architecture lectures, too; I should be more than grateful if you would continue them as before. Thank you so much-- Ah, I beg your pardon?"

Katharine here made a desperate inroad into the torrent of words, and mentioned that she knew no Latin and had never taught any drawing.

"Indeed? But you are too modest, my dear Miss Austen; it is your one failing, if I may say so. Of course, if you wish--then let it be so.

But I am convinced you would do both as well as Miss Smithson, quite convinced. However, that can easily be arranged. The salary I think you know, and the lectures will be as before. Indeed, we are most fortunate to have so delightful a lecturer, most fortunate. Ah, there is one more thing," continued Mrs. Downing, leading her towards the door. The rest of her speech was said on the landing which happened, fortunately, to be empty. "This is between ourselves, my dear Miss Austen,--quite between ourselves. I should be more than grateful if you would act as chaperon to the music master this term. It may appear strange that I should ask you to do this,--indeed, I may say peculiar; but I do so in the conviction that I can trust you better than any one else. Of course you will not mention what I have said! I am sure you understand what I mean. That is so charming of you! Thank you so much!"

And the lady princ.i.p.al returned to say very much the same thing over again to the next teacher whom she summoned. But Katharine, who had long since learnt to regard her insincerity as inevitable, merely congratulated herself on the practical results of her interview, and thoroughly enjoyed the contest that ensued when her new pupils found they were going to be taught by a junior mistress. She felt very elated when she came out of it victorious; and for the next week or two everything seemed to go well with her. She had made a position for herself, although every one had told her it would be impossible; there were people who believed in her thoroughly, and there were others, like Ted and Phyllis Hyam, who did not understand her but worshipped her blindly. It was all very gratifying to her, after the dull month she had spent at home; and for the first time she threw off the reserve she usually showed, though unconsciously, towards the working gentlewomen of Queen's Crescent, and talked about herself in a way that astonished them not a little. Work to them was a sordid necessity, and they were a little jealous of this brilliant girl, with the youth and the talent, who found no difficulty in winning success where they had barely earned a living, and who seemed to enjoy her life into the bargain.

"Who is that girl with the jolly laugh and the untidy hair?" she overheard a stranger asking Polly Newland one day.

"That one?" was the reply, given in a contemptuous tone. "Oh, she's a caution, I can tell you! Nice? Oh, I dare say! She's a prig, though.

Phyllis Hyam--that's the other girl in our room--thinks all the world of her; but I can't stand prigs, myself."

It was a little shock to her self-esteem to hear herself described so baldly, though she consoled herself by the reflection that Polly had never liked her, and there was consequently very little value to be attached to her opinion. But she was careful to remain silent about her own affairs for the next day or two; and she startled Ted, one evening, by asking him suddenly, between the acts of a melodrama, what was meant by a "prig."

"A prig? Oh, I don't know! It's the same thing as a smug, isn't it?"

"But what is a smug?"

"Well, of course, a smug is--well, he's a smug, I suppose. He hasn't got to be anything else, has he? He's a played-out sort of bounder, who wants to have a good time and hasn't the pluck, don't you know?"

"Are all prigs bounders?" asked Katharine, in a voice of dismay.

"Oh, I expect so! It doesn't matter, does it? At least, there's a chap in our office who is a bit of a prig, and he isn't a bounder exactly.

He's a very decent sort of chap, really; I don't half mind him, myself. But they always call him a prig because he goes in for being so mighty saintly; at least, that's what they say. I don't think he is so bad as all that, myself."

"Is it priggish to be good, then? I thought one ought to try."

"My dear Kit, of course you are a girl; don't worry yourself about it.

It's altogether different for a girl, don't you see?"

"Then girls are never prigs?" said Katharine eagerly.

"Bless their hearts," said Ted vaguely; and she did not get any further definition from him that evening.

And so the days grew into weeks, and her life became filled with new interests, and she told herself she was learning to live at last. But she had her bad days, as well; and on these she felt that something was still wanting in her life. And the end of February came, and Paul Wilton had not yet returned to his chambers in Ess.e.x Court.

CHAPTER XII

The courts had just risen, and the barristers in their wigs and gowns were hastening through the Temple on the way to their various chambers. It was not a day on which to linger, for a pitiless east wind swept across Fountain Court, making little eddies in the basin of water where the goldfish swam, and swirling the dust into little sandstorms to blind the shivering people who were using the thoroughfare down to the Embankment. The city clocks were chiming the quarter after four, as Paul Wilton came along with the precise and measured step that never varied whatever the weather might be, and mounted the wooden staircase that led to his rooms. A man rose from his easiest chair as he walked into his sitting-room, and they greeted one another in the cordial though restrained manner of men who had not met for some time.

"Sorry you've been waiting, Heaton. Been here long?" said Paul, throwing off his gown with more rapidity than he usually showed.

"Oh, no matter; my fault for getting here too early," returned Heaton cheerily, as he sat down again and pulled his chair closer to the fire. He never entered anybody's house without making elaborate preparations to stay a long while.

"Fact is," he continued, "it's so long since I saw you that, directly I heard you were back, I felt I must come round and look you up. It was young Linton who told me,--you remember Linton? Ran across him in the club, last night; he knows some friends of yours,--Kerry, or Keeley, or some such name as that; just been calling on them, apparently, and they told him you had travelled back with them.

Suppose you know the people I mean?"

Paul admitted that he knew the people he had been travelling with, and Heaton rattled on afresh.