Betty Vivian Part 39

"What do you want with me?" said Betty. The brilliance in her eyes which had been so remarkable a few minutes ago had now faded; her cheeks looked pale; her small face wore a hungry expression.

"Mrs. Haddo wants to see you, Betty."

"Oh--but--must I go?"

"Need you ask, Betty Vivian? The head mistress commands your presence."

"Then I will go."

"Remember, I trust you," said Miss Symes.

"You may," answered the girl. She drew herself up and walked quickly and with great dignity through the lounge into the great corridor beyond, and so towards Mrs. Haddo's sitting-room. Here she knocked, and was immediately admitted.

"Betty, I wish to speak to you," said Mrs. Haddo. "Sit down, dear. You and I have not had a chat for some time."

"A very weary and long time ago!" answered Betty. All the vivacity which had marked her face in the lounge had left it.

But Mrs. Haddo, who could read character so rapidly and with such unerring instinct, knew that the girl was, so to speak, on guard. She was guarding herself, and was under a very strong tension. "I have something to say to you, Betty," said Mrs. Haddo.

Betty lowered her eyes.

"Look at me, my child."

With an effort Betty raised her eyes, glanced at Mrs. Haddo, and then looked down again. "Wait, please, will you?" she said.

"I am about to do so. You are unhappy."

Betty nodded.

"Will you tell me what is the matter?"

Betty shook her head.

"Do you think it is right for you to be unhappy in a school like mine, and not to tell me--not to tell the one who is placed over you as a mother would be placed were she alive--what is troubling you?"

"It may be wrong," said Betty; "but even so, I cannot tell you."

"You must understand," said Mrs. Haddo, speaking with great restraint and extreme distinctness, "that it is impossible for me to allow this state of things to continue. I know nothing, and yet in one sense I know all. Nothing has been told me with regard to the true story of your unhappiness, but the knowledge that you are unhappy reached me before you yourself confirmed it. To-night Mr. Fairfax found you out of doors--a broken rule, Betty, but I pa.s.s that over. He heard you sobbing in the bitterness of your distress, and discovered that you were lying face downwards on the gra.s.s in the fir-plantation. When he called you, you went to him and told him you had lost something."

"So I have," answered Betty.

"Is it because of that you are unhappy?"

"Yes, because of that--altogether because of that."

"What have you lost, dear?"

"Mrs. Haddo, I cannot tell you."

"Betty, I ask you to do so. I have a right to know. I stand to you in the place of a mother. I repeat that I have a right to know."

"I cannot--I cannot tell you!" replied Betty.

Mrs. Haddo, who had been seated, now rose, went over to the girl, and put one hand on her shoulder.

Betty s.h.i.+vered from head to foot. Then she sprang to her feet and moved a little away. "Don't!" she said. "When you touch me it is like fire!"

"My touch, Betty Vivian, like fire!"

"Oh, you know that I love you!" sobbed poor Betty.

"Prove it, then, dear, by giving me your confidence."

"I would," said Betty, speaking rapidly, "if that which is causing me suffering had anything at all to do with you. But it has nothing to do with you, Mrs. Haddo, nor with the school, nor with the girls in the school. It is my own private trouble. Once I had a treasure. The treasure is gone."

"You would, perhaps, like it back again?" said Mrs. Haddo.

"Ah yes--yes! but I cannot get it. Some one has taken it. It is gone."

"Once again, Betty, I ask you to give me your confidence."

"I cannot."

Mrs. Haddo resumed her seat. "Is that your very last--your final--decision, Betty Vivian?"

"It is, Mrs. Haddo."

"How old are you, dear?"

"I have told you. I was sixteen and a half when I came. I am rather more now."

"You are only a child, dear Betty."

"Not in mind, nor in life, nor in circ.u.mstances," replied Betty.

"We will suppose that all that is true," answered Mrs. Haddo. "We will suppose, also, that you are cast upon the world friendless and alone.

Were such a thing to happen, what would you do?"

Betty s.h.i.+vered. "I don't know," she replied.

"Now, Betty, I cannot take your answer as final. I will give you a few days longer; at the end of that time I will again beg for your confidence. In the meanwhile I must say something very plainly. You came to this school with your sisters under special conditions which you, my poor child, had nothing to do with. But I must say frankly that I was unwilling to admit you three into the school after term had begun, and it was contrary to my rules to take girls straight into the upper school who had never been in the lower school. Nevertheless, for the sake of my old friend Sir John Crawford, I did this."

"Not for f.a.n.n.y's sake, I hope?" said Betty, her eyes flas.h.i.+ng for a minute, and a queer change coming over her face.

"I have done what I did, Betty, for the sake of my dear friend Sir John Crawford, who is your guardian and your sisters' guardian, and who is now in India. I was unwilling to have you, my dears; but when you arrived and I saw you, Betty, I thanked G.o.d, for I thought that I perceived in you one whom I could love, whom I could train, whom I could help. I was interested in you, very deeply interested, from the first. I perceived with pleasure that my feelings towards you were shared by your schoolfellows. You became a favorite, and you became so just because of that beautiful birthright of yours--your keen wit, your unselfishness, and your pleasant and bright ways. I did an extraordinary thing when I admitted you into the school, and your schoolfellows did a thing quite as extraordinary when they allowed you, a newcomer, to join that special club which, more than anything else, has laid the foundation of sound and n.o.ble morals in the school. You were made a Speciality. I have nothing to do with the club, my dear; but I was pleased--nay, I was proud--when I saw that my girls had such discernment as to select you as one of their, I might really say august, number. You took your honors in precisely the spirit I should have expected of you--sweetly, modestly, without any undue sense of pride or hateful self-righteousness. Then, a few days ago, there came a thunderclap; and teachers and girls were alike amazed to find that you were no longer a member. By the rules of the club we were not permitted to ask any questions----"

"But I, as a late member, am permitted to tell you this much, Mrs.

Haddo. I was, and I think quite rightly, expelled from the club."