“I won’t keep you a moment.  I am to see Miss Heath to tell her——­ Prissie paused.  Her face grew deadly white.  “I am to see Miss Heath to tell her—­ to tell her—­ that I—­ oh, Maggie!  I must give up my classics.  I must; it’s all settled.  Don’t say anything.  Don’t tempt me to reconsider the question.  It can’t be reconsidered, and my mind is made up.  That’s it; it’s a trouble, but I must go through with it.  Good night, Maggie.”

Prissie held out her long, unformed hand; Miss Oliphant clasped it between both her own.

“You are trembling,” she said, standing up and drawing the girl toward her.  “I don’t want to argue the point if you so firmly forbid me.  I think you quite mad, of course.  It is absolutely impossible for me to sympathize with such wild folly.  Still, if your mind is made up, I won’t interfere.  But, seeing that at one time we were very firm friends, you might give me your reasons, Priscilla.”

Priscilla slowly and stiffly withdrew her hands; her lips moved.  She was repeating Miss Oliphant’s words under her breath: 

“At one time we were friends.”

“Won’t you speak?” said Maggie impatiently.

“Oh, yes, I’ll speak, I’ll tell you the reason.  You won’t understand, but you had better know—­” Prissie paused again; she seemed to swallow something; her next words came out slowly with great difficulty:  “When I went home for the Christmas recess I found Aunt Raby worse.  You don’t know what my home is like, Miss Oliphant; it is small and poor.  At home we are often cold and often hungry.  I have three little sisters, and they want clothes and education; they want training, they want love, they want care.  Aunt Raby is too weak to do much for them now; she is very, very ill.  You have not an idea—­ not an idea—­ Miss Oliphant, in your wealth and your luxury, what the poverty of Penywern Cottage is like.  What does such poverty mean?  How shall I describe it to you?  We are sometimes glad of a piece of bread; butter is a luxury; meat we scarcely taste.”  Prissie again broke off to think and consider her next words.  Maggie, whose sympathies were always keenly aroused by any real emotion, tried once again to take her hands; Prissie put them behind her.  “Aunt Raby is a good woman,” continued Priscilla; “she is brave, she is a heroine.  Although she is just a commonplace old woman, no one has ever led a grander life in its way.  She wears poor clothes—­ oh, the poorest; she has an uncouth appearance, worse even than I have, but I am quite sure that God—­ God respects her—­ God thinks her worthy.  When my father and mother died (I was fourteen when my dear mother died) Aunt Raby came and took me home and my three little sisters.  She gave us bread to eat.  Oh, yes, we never quite wanted food, but before we came Aunt Raby had enough money to feed herself and no more.  She took us all in and supported us, because she worked so very, very hard.  Ever since I was fourteen—­ I am eighteen now—­