A Sweet Girl Graduate Part 11

"You pa.s.sed the examination creditably," said Miss Heath. "I have looked through your papers. Your answers were not stereotyped. They were much better; they were thoughtful. Whoever has educated you, you have been well taught. You can think."

"Oh, yes, my dear friend, Mr. Hayes, always said that was the first thing."

"Ah, that accounts for it," replied Miss Heath. "You have had the advantage of listening to a cultivated man's conversation. You ought to do very well here. What do you mean to take up?"

"Oh, everything. I can't know too much."

Miss Heath laughed and looked at Maggie. Maggie was lying back in her easy-chair, her head resting luxuriously against a dark velvet cus.h.i.+on. She was tapping the floor slightly with her small foot; her eyes were fixed on Prissie. When Miss Heath laughed Maggie echoed the sound, but both laughs were in the sweetest sympathy.

"You must not overwork yourself, my dear," said Miss Heath. "That would be a very false beginning. I think-- I am sure-- that you have an earnest and ardent nature, but you must avoid an extreme which will only end in disaster."

Prissie frowned.

"What do you mean?" she said. "I have come here to study. It has been done with such, such difficulty. It would be cruel to waste a moment.

I mustn't; it wouldn't be right. You can't mean what you say."

Miss Heath was silent. She thought it kinder to look away from Prissie. After a moment she said in a voice which she on purpose made intensely quiet and matter of fact:

"Many girls come to St. Benet's, Miss Peel, who are, I fancy, circ.u.mstanced like you. Their friends find it difficult to send them here, but they make the sacrifice, sometimes in one way, sometimes in another-- and the girls come. They know it is their duty to study; they have an ulterior motive, which underlies everything else. They know by and by they must pay back."

"Oh, yes," said Priscilla, starting forward and a flush coming into her face. "I know that-- that is what it is for. To pay back worthily-- to give back a thousandfold what you have received. Those girls can't be idle, can they?" she added in a gentle, piteous sort of way.

"My dear, there have been several such girls at St. Benet's, and none of them has been idle; they have been best and first among our students. Many of them have done more than well-- many of them have brought fame to St. Benet's. They are in the world now and earning honorable livelihoods as teachers or in other departments where cultivated women can alone take the field. These girls are all paying back a thousandfold those who have helped them."

"Yes," said Prissie.

"You would like to follow their example?"

"Oh, yes; please tell me about them."

"Some of them were like you and thought they would take up everything-- everything I mean in the scholastic line. They filled their days with lectures and studied into the short hours of the night. Maggie, dear, please tell Miss Peel about Good-night and Good-morning."

"They were such a funny pair," said Maggie. "They had rooms next to each other in our corridor, Miss Peel. They were both studying for a tripos, and during the term before the examination one went to bed at four and one got up at four. Mary Joliffe used to go into Susan Martin's room and say good morning to her. Susan used to raise such a white face and say, 'Good night, my dear.' Well, poor things, neither of them got a tripos; they worked too hard."

"The simple English of all this," said Miss Heath, "is that the successful girl here is the girl who takes advantage of the whole life mapped out for her, who divides her time between play and work, who joins the clubs and enters heartily into the social life of the place.

Yes," she added, looking suddenly full at Priscilla, "these last words of mine may seem strange to you, dear. Believe me, however, they are true. But I know," she added with a sigh, "that it takes rather an old person to believe in the education of play."

Priscilla looked unconvinced.

"I must do what you wish," she said, "for, of course, you ought to know."

"What a lame kind of a.s.sent, my love! Maggie, you will have to gently lure this young person into the paths of frivolity. I promise you, my dear, that you shall be a very cultivated woman some day; but I only promise this if you will take advantage of all sides of the pleasant life here. Now tell me what are your particular tastes? What branch of study do you like best?"

"I love Latin and Greek better than anything else in the world."

"Do you truly?" said Maggie, suddenly starting forward. "Then in one thing we have a great sympathy. What have you read? Do tell me."

Miss Heath stepped directly into the background. The two girls conversed for a long time together.

CHAPTER X

ST. HILDA'S CHAPEL

"HERE we are now," said Maggie Oliphant, touching her young companion; "we are in good time; this is the outer chapel. Yes, I know all that you are thinking, but you need not speak; I did not want to speak the first time I came to St. Hilda's. Just follow me quickly. I know this verger; he will put us into two stalls; then it will be perfect."

"Yes," answered Priscilla. She spoke in an awed kind of voice. The cool effect of the dark oak, combined with the richness of the many shafts of colored light coming from the magnificent windows, gave her own face a curious expression. Was it caused by emotion or by the strange lights in the chapel?

Maggie glanced at her, touched her hand for a moment and then hurried forward to her seat.

The girls were accommodated with stalls just above the choir. They could read out of the college prayer-books and had a fine view of the church.

The congregation streamed in, the choir followed; the doors between the chapel and ante-chapel were shut, the curtains were dropped and the service began.

There is no better musical service in England than that which Sunday after Sunday is conducted at St. Hilda's Chapel at Kingsdene. The harmony and the richness of the sounds which fill that old chapel can scarcely be surpa.s.sed. The boys send up notes clear and sweet as nightingales into the fretted arches of the roof; the men's deeper notes swell the music until it breaks on the ears in a full tide of perfect harmony; the great organ fills in the breaks and pauses. This splendid service of song seems to reach perfection. In its way earth cannot give anything more perfect.

Maggie Oliphant did not come very often to St. Hilda's. At one time she was a constant wors.h.i.+per there, but that was a year ago, before something happened which changed her. Then Sunday after Sunday two lovely girls used to walk up the aisle side by side. The verger knew them and reserved their favorite stalls for them. They used to kneel together and listen to the service, and, what is more, take part in it.

But a time came when one of the girls could never return to St.

Hilda's and the other, people said, did not care to sit in the old seat without her. They said she missed her friend and was more cut up than any one else at the sudden death of one so fair and lovely.

When Maggie took her place in the old stall to-day more than one person turned to look at her with interest.

Maggie always made a picturesque effect; she wore a large hat, with a drooping plume of feathers; her dress was very rich and dark; her fair face shone in the midst of these surroundings like an exquisite flower.

The service went on. During the prayers Maggie wept, but, when a great wave of song filled the vast building, she forgot all her sorrow; her voice rose with the other singers, clear, sweet and high. Her soul seemed to go up on her voice, for all the sadness left her face; her eyes looked jubilant.

Prissie had never been in any place like St. Hilda's before. It had been one of her dreams to go to the cathedral at Exeter, but year after year this desire of hers had been put off and put off, and this was the first time in her life that she had ever listened to cathedral music. She was impressed, delighted, but not overpowered.

"The organ is magnificent," she said to herself, "but not grander than the sea. The sea accompanies all the service at the dear little old church at home."

People met and talked to one another in the green quadrangle outside the chapel. Several other St. Benet girls had come to the afternoon service. Among them was Miss Day and that fair, innocent-looking little girl, Rosalind Merton.

Miss Day and Miss Merton were together. They were both stepping back to join Maggie and Prissie, when a tall, dark young man came hastily forward, bowed to Rosalind Merton, and, coming up to Maggie Oliphant, shook hands with her.

"I saw you in chapel," he said. "Are you coming to the Marshall's to tea?"

"I am. Let me introduce to you my friend, Miss Peel. Miss Peel, this is Mr. Hammond."

Hammond raised his hat to Prissie, said a courteous word to her and then turned to speak again to Maggie.

The three walked through the gates of the quadrangle and turned up the narrow, picturesque High Street. It would soon be dusk; a wintry light was over everything. Rosalind Merton and Miss Day followed behind.

Maggie, who was always absorbed with the present interest, did not heed or notice them, but Priscilla heard one or two ill-bred giggles.

She turned her head with indignation and received scornful glances from both girls. The four met for a moment at a certain corner. Maggie said something to Annie Day and introduced Mr. Hammond to her. As she did so, Rosalind took the opportunity to come up to Priscilla and whisper to her:

"You're not wanted, you know. You had much better come home with us."

"What do you mean?" replied Prissie in her matter-of-fact voice. "Miss Oliphant has asked me to go with her to the Marshalls'."