Consequences

ho

marked by a series o

asses when she wished to gain the approbation of an attractive class-mistress, and idle and inattentive when she want

Torrance beautiful, though her beauty did not strike Alex until after she had fallen a helpless victim to one

daughter in valediction, "but remember that exclusive friendships are not to be desired. Friendly

e and inordinate of attachments lay within the scope of Alex' emotional c

ing in return. Practically she suffered tortures of jealousy if the loved one addressed a word or smile to any but

convent made very little impression upon her, excepting in re

erve to recall the vivid presentment of the tall Belgian postulante whose duty it was to apply it with a huge mop, and whom, from a distance only to

of the daily three o'clock interval for go?ter, with Queenie Torrance pacing beside her in the garden quadrangle, one hand of each rolled

vening recreation, spent in the enforced and detested amusement of la ronde, when her only preoccupation was to place herself by the object of her

Alex long after the words had lost the savour of

horrible

postula

sup

e une

comble

oeur de c

ory of the great square verger, in the middle of gravelled alleys, brought to her mind for sole token of summer, only her horror of the immense pa

e in the world, only

ing in it all the misapplication of an essential f

ction and for her prodigality in bestowing it. She was like a child

ter were the in

iculate, unreasoned adoration for the Belgian postulante. But the Belgian postulante was never v

return. Alex knew it, and recklessly spent all her weekly pocket-money on flowers and sweets for Marie-Angèle, thinking that the gifts would touch her and awaken in her an affection that it was not her nature to bestow, least o

for your f

u for my

one-sided relations into which Alex entered so ra

old to look after her, and went to the task with a certain na?ve eagerness, that she always brought to bear upon any personal equation. In an hour, she was secretly combating an enraptured

hair which fell back from her face, and over her shoulders into natural heavy ringlets. She was not very pretty, although she was often thought so, but she was charged with a certain animal magnetism, almost inseparable from her type. Half the girls in the school adored

Lady Isabel Clare's daughter was likely to a

difficulties for her idol, Queenie at first received with a graceful gratitude which yet held in

thing, and received with eager thankfulness

caressing exclamations. Hers was not a nature ever to make

to discourage a love, however one-sided, that found its expression in tireless sympathy, endless championship, and unlimited material gifts and help of any or every description. Alex did all that she could of Queenie's lessons, made her bed and mended her clothes for her whenever she

is a liar, and that all liars go to Hell. Yet by some utterly illogical perversity of which she was hardly even aware, it did not shock or very much distress her, to find that Queenie Torrance told lies, and told them, moreover,

ere apparently no abstract standards of right and wrong. Where she loved, thou

gratifying her vanity, by seeking to test the length

one here, and they all sent me to C

, of c

were in

ence. In fact, you'd need it m

claimed. "If I were in the wro

eople who are in the wrong who need most to have their part take

much idea of justice, Al

for her own impiety in setting the objects of her affection far above what she conceived to be the abstract standard of right and

x sometimes review the s

of elementary religious teaching put her at a disadvantage in the convent atmosphere, and made its frequent religious services and instructions

ish Assistant Superior would so willingly have extended to her youthful compatriot were alike without effect upon Alex. She was not drawn to any of the

ed, if not admittedly sanctioned, by the authorities. It would almost inevitably have led Alex to an awakening of religious sensibilities and the desirability o

e Baptiste and Marie Evangeliste of her convent days with indifference, and devote he

upon by no one, and thereb

t infringement of rules to which Alex' pursuit exposed her, but-one could not be unkind. She did not know why Alex Clare showed her especial affection-she herself had done nothing to encourage these indiscreet displays. Of course, it w

C'est Alex qui vous recherche malgré

admitted of no loophole for open defiance or outspoken rebuke, Alex' evasions of that law of detachment which is the primary one in convent legislation, beca

to obtain Alex as companion at la ronde, or when they played games in the garden. She never infringed one of the strictest rules of th

erceived, and cut Alex to the heart by telling her sometimes that she made it very hard fo

nie's bent profile in the chapel, utterly unconscious of the scandal which her manifest idolatry was creating for the severe nun in the carved stall opposite. She was scolded, placed under strict obser

is, and nicknamed by the children "the Last Judgment," was held in the Grande Salle downstairs, with the Superior making her state entry after the children had been decorously

rrying a sheaf of notes and a great book, which each pupil firmly believed t

ce, spoke a few words of prayer, and settled herself in the

class were read aloud and each mite stood up in her place for all the universe to gaze at her, while the

emière en géographie ... calcul, beaucoup mie

bonne

curls bobbing over her face, is pink with gratification. Her young class-mi

elle se corrige de cette vilaine habitude de mor

ites voir.... V

eshly washed tiny pink hands thrust ou

us ferez bien attention a

, every one laughs, and then the ser

ly from the Superior. Then their class-mistress claps her hands smartly and they get up and file out of the ro

ess, taking no trouble over her lessons, worst of all, taking no trouble to cure

chapel, Ma Mè

it is against all rules, it is extre

bon of an aspirante enfant de Marie until she has reformed her ways. The mention of a premiè

s of the moyenne division of the school, with very fe

a name to which the reader, a French woman, always takes excepti

cular séance, the April one, she took her glances more or less surreptitiously, miserably aware

on or talent alike. But her perfectly serene complacency was more or less justified by the exaggerated applause of her companions at h

s independent of anythi

rward and asked a que

ère Supéri

e purport, was emphatic. She felt glad and relieved, but had

Mère Alphonsine sonoro

egard of the rule of silence, and frequent bad marks for disorder and unpunctuality. But to the accusations which she knew by heart, and sha

innie sans cesse, m

ing the years when Alex Clare and her contemporaries were at school, can ga

e homilies, some of them pityingly reproachful, and others explanatorily so, on the same

rine that fell from her stiff, hard, white collar to the shapeless waistband of her skirt, th

ee of the mistresses add each her quota, for the most part regretfully and wi

rself next to Queenie at almost ev

s folly get the better of her-one can see how she

charges

spoken to her with kindness and tenderness; in private, had reasoned with her and finally threatened h

lightning-swift flash of reproach that had sho

this public coupling of her immaculate reputatio

thout hearing further blame or reproach, without encountering the ridicule of her companions or the cold withdrawal of

being is the blackest in the world, be

of an inexpressible guilt upon her, and all the utter isolation of

rlornly that an accusation mattered nothing if unjust, since the consciousne

nd shamefully she supposed, without volition of her own she knew, amongst those standards to which the right thinking conformed, and which she, on

e was as colourless as eve

ess in her direction, but Queenie passed on to the refectory wher

hopeless loneliness, which made up Alex' schooldays, t

that strangled her and broke in spite of all her efforts into the decorous silence of the refectory, even the awed and

own and told Alex that she might leave the table. The long progress down the en

swept over her was to ebb and f

t bitter wave to engulf her, and each time add to the undermining

of outlook rather more overshadowed, her childish strength less steady, and, above all, set fast in her childish mind the ineradicable,