‘No, we did not,’ said Valetta.

’And so, my dear child, I do forgive you, quite and entirely, as we used to say, though I have settled with Miss Leverett that you had better not go up for the examination, since you cannot be properly up to it.  And you must write the whole history to your mother.  Yes; I know it will be very sad work, but it will be much better to have it out and done with, instead of having it on your mind when she comes home.’

‘Shall you tell her!’

‘Yes, certainly,’ said the aunt, well knowing that this would clench the matter.  ’But I shall tell her how sorry you are, and that I really think you did not quite understand what you were about at first.  And I shall write to Miss White, and try to comfort her about her sister.’

‘You won’t say I told!’

’Oh no; but I shall have quite reason enough for writing in telling her that I am sorry my little niece led her sister into crooked paths.’

Gillian knew that this letter was written and sent, and it did not make her more eager for a meeting with Kalliope.  So that she was not sorry that the weather was a valid hindrance, though a few weeks ago she would have disregarded such considerations.  Besides, there was her own examination, which for two days was like a fever, and kept her at her little table, thinking of nothing but those questions, and dreaming and waking over them at night.

It was over; and she was counselled on all sides to think no more about it till she should hear of success or failure.  But this was easier said than done, and she was left in her tired state with a general sense of being on a wrong tack, and of going on amiss, whether due to her aunt’s want of assimilation to herself, or to her mother’s absence, she did not know, and with the further sense that she had not been the motherly sister she had figured to herself, but that both the children should show a greater trust and reliance on Aunt Jane than on herself grieved her, not exactly with jealousy, but with sense of failure and dissatisfaction with herself.  She had a universal distaste to her surroundings, and something very like dread of the Whites, and she rejoiced in the prospect of quitting Rockstone for the present.

She felt bound to run down to the office to wish Kalliope good-bye.  There she found an accumulation of exercises and translations waiting for her.

’Oh, what a quantity!  It shows how long it is since I have been here.’

‘And indeed,’ began Kalliope, ’since your aunt has been so very kind about poor little Maura—–­’

’Oh, please don’t talk to me!  There’s such a lot to do, and I have no time.  Wait till I have done.’

And she nervously began reading out the Greek exercise, so as effectually to stop Kalliope’s mouth.  Moreover, either her own uneasy mind, or the difficulty of the Greek, brought her into a dilemma.  She saw that Alexis’s phrase was wrong, but she did not clearly perceive what the sentence ought to be, and she perplexed herself over it till he came in, whether to her satisfaction or not she could not have told, for she had not wanted to see him on the one hand, though, on the other, it silenced Kalliope.