“You go to our school, don’t you?” she said.

“Yes, miss,” answered the girl, dropping a little curtsy when she saw Kathleen.  She was a very fresh foundation girl, and recognized something in Kathleen which caused her to be more subservient than was necessary.

“Then, if you please,” continued Kathleen, “can you tell me where that sweetly pretty girl, Ruth Craven, lives?”

“She isn’t a lady,” said the girl, whose name was Susan Hopkins.  “She is no more a lady than I am.”

“Indeed she is,” said Kathleen.  “She is a great deal more of a lady than you are.”

The girl flushed.

“You are a Great Shirley girl yourself,” she said.  “I saw you there to-day.  You are in an awfully low class.  Do you like sitting with the little kids?  I saw you towering up in the middle of them like a mountain.”

Kathleen’s eyes flashed.

“What is your name?” she asked.

“Susan Hopkins.  I used to be a Board School girl, but now I am on the foundation at Great Shirley.  It is a big rise for me.  Are you a poor girl?  Are you on the foundation?”

“I don’t know what it means by being on the foundation, but I don’t think I am poor.  I think, on the contrary, that I am very rich.  Did you ever hear of a girl who lived in a castle—­a great beautiful castle—­on the top of a high hill?  If you ever did, I am that girl.”

“Oh, my!” said Susy Hopkins.  “That does sound romantic.”

Her momentary dislike to Kathleen had vanished.  The desire to go to the town on a message for her mother had completely left her.  She stood still, as though fascinated.

“I live there,” said Kathleen—­“that is, I do when I am at home.  I come from the land of the mountain and the stream; of the shamrock; of the deep, deep blue sea.”

“Ireland?  Are you Irish?” said the girl.

“I am proud to say that I am.”

“We don’t think anything of the Irish here.”

“Oh, don’t you?”

“But don’t be angry, please,” continued Susy, “for I am sure you are very nice.”

“I am nice when I like.  To-day I am nasty.  I am wicked to-day—­quite wicked; I could hate any one who opposes me.  I want some one to help me; if some one will help me, I will be nice to that person.  Will you?”

“Oh, my word, yes!  How handsome you look when you flash your eyes!” said Susy Hopkins.

“Then I want to find that dear little girl, who is so beautiful that I love her and can’t get her out of my head.  I want to find Ruth Craven.  She went away with a horrid, stiff, pokery girl called Cassandra Weldon.  You have such strange names in your country.  That horrid, prim Cassandra chose to correct me when I came into school, and she has taken my darling away—­the only one I love in the whole of England.  I want to find her.  I will give you—–­ I will give you an Irish diamond set in a brooch if you will help me.”