climb the mulberry in the garden, and because she hadn’t begun Latin. But all the time, I envied her horribly, and I expect you did too, Alice. Can’t you see her black silk stockings—and her new hat with those awfully pretty flowers, made of feathers? She had a silk frock too—white, very skimp, and short; and enormously long black legs, as thin as sticks; and her hair in plaits. I felt a thick lump beside her. And I didn’t like her at all. What horrid toads children are! She didn’t talk to us much, but her eyes seemed to be always laughing at us, and when she talked Italian to her mother, I thought she was showing off, and I wanted to pinch her for being affected.” 

 “Why, of course she talked Italian,” said Alice, who was not much interested in her sister’s recollections. 

 “Naturally. But that didn’t somehow occur to me. After all I was only seven.” 

 “I wonder if she’s really good-looking,” said Alice slowly, glancing, as she spoke, at the reflection of herself in an old dilapidated mirror, which hung on the schoolroom wall. 

 “The photos are,” said Nora decidedly. “Goodness, I wish she’d come and get it over. I want to get back to my work—and till she comes, I can’t settle to anything.” 

 “Well, they’ll be here directly. I wonder what on earth she’ll do with all her money. Father says she may spend it, if she wants to. He’s trustee, but Uncle Risborough’s letter to him said she was to have the income if she wished—now. Only she’s not to touch the capital till she’s twenty-five.” 

 “It’s a good lot, isn’t it?” said Nora, walking about. “I wonder how many people in Oxford have two thousand a year? A girl too. It’s really rather exciting.” 

 “It won’t be very nice for us—she’ll be so different.” Alice’s tone was a little sulky and depressed. The advent of this girl cousin, with her title, her good looks, her money, and her unfair advantages in the way of talking French and Italian, was only moderately pleasant to the eldest Miss Hooper. 

 “What—you think she’ll snuff us out?” laughed Nora. “Not she! Oxford’s not like London. People are not such snobs.” 

 “What a silly thing to say, Nora! As if it wasn’t an enormous pull everywhere to have a handle to your name, and lots of money!” 

 “Well, I really think it’ll matter less here than anywhere. Oxford, my dear—or some of it—pursues ‘the good and the beautiful’”—said Nora, taking a 

 Prev. P 4/282 next