Part 16

"I shall have finished in another five minutes, and then there will be no more letters to write, my child. Sit where you choose; take a book, and be quiet; I shall not keep you waiting long."

The words were few; the Mother-Superior's manner a little curt in speaking them. But where Lynette chose to sit was on the cheap drugget that covered the beeswaxed boards, with her squirrel-coloured hair and soft cheek pressed against the black serge habit.

The Mother-Superior wrote on, apparently absorbed, and with knitted brows of attention, but her large, white, beautiful left hand dropped half unconsciously to the silken hair and the velvet cheek, and stayed there.

There is a type of woman the lightest touch of whose hand is subtler and more sweet than the most honeyed kisses of others. And the Mother-Superior was not liberal of caresses. When Lynette turned her lips to the hand, the face that bent over the paper remained as stern and as absorbed as ever. She went on writing, directed, closed, and stamped her letter, and set it aside under a pebble of white quartz, lined and streaked with the faint silvery green of gold.

"Now, my child?"

The girl said, flushing scarlet:

"Reverend Mother, I have told the Red Class the truth about me!"

The Mother-Superior started; dismay was in her face.

"Why, child?"

"I--I mean"--the scarlet flush gave place to paleness--"that I have no name and no family, and no friends except you, dearest, and the Sisters. That you found me, and took me in, and have kept me out of charity."

"Was it necessary to have told--anything whatever?"

"I think so, Mother, and I am glad now that I have done it. There will be no need for deception any more."

"My daughter, there has never been the slightest deception of any kind whatsoever upon your part, or the part of anyone else who knew. No interests suffered by your keeping your own secret. Who first solicited your confidence in this matter?"

"Greta Du Taine."

"Greta Du Taine." Very cold was the tone of the Mother-Superior. "May I ask how she received the information she had the bad taste to seek?"

"Mother--she took it--not quite as I expected."

"Yet she and you have always been friends, my child."

Lynette rose up upon her knees. The long arm of the Mother-Superior went round the slight figure that leaned against her, and in the sudden gesture was a passion of protecting motherhood.

"Mother, she does not wish to be my friend any longer. She was quite horrified to remember that she had invited me to stay with her at the Du Taine place near Johannesburg. But she said that if I liked she would not tell the class."

"I have no fear of the rest of the class. They have honour, and good feeling, and warm hearts. What was your reply to Greta's obliging proposition?"

"I told her that the sooner everybody knew the better; and I went out of the room, and came to you--as I always do--as I always have done, ever since----"

Her voice broke in the first sob.

"Ah!" cried the voice of the mother-heart she crept to, as the long arms in the loose black serge sleeves went out and folded her close, "ah, if I might be always here for you to run to! But God knows best!"

She said aloud, gently putting the girl away:

"Well, the ordeal is over, and will not have to be gone through again. And for the future, bear in mind that every human being has a right to regard his own business--or hers--as private, and to exclude the curious from affairs which do not concern them." She reached out quick tender hands, and framed the wistful, sensitive face in them, and added, in a lower tone: "For a little told may beget in them the desire to know more. And always remember this: that the only just claim to your perfect confidence in all that concerns your past life, and I say all with meaning"--the girl's white eyelids fell under her earnest gaze, and the delicate lips began to quiver--"will rest in the man--the honourable and brave and worthy gentleman--who I pray may one day be your husband."

"No!" she cried out sharply as if in terror, and the slight figure was shaken by a sudden spasm of trembling. "Oh, Mother, no! Never, never!"

With a gesture of infinite pity and tenderness the Mother drew her close, and hid the shame-dyed face upon her bosom, and whispered, with her lips upon the red-brown hair:

"My lamb, my dearest, my poor, poor child! It shall be never if you choose, Lynette. But make no rash vows, no determinations that you think irrevocable. Leave the future to God. Now dry these dear eyes, and put old thoughts and memories of sorrow and of wrong most resolutely away from you. Be happy, as Our Lord meant all innocent creatures of His to be. And do not be tempted to magnify Greta's offence against friendship. She has acted according to her lights, and if they are of the kind that shine in marshy places, a better Light will shine upon her path one day. I know that you have real affection for her ... though I must own I have always wondered in what lay the secret of her popularity in the school?"