"Oh, you are going! You are going, and what is to become of me without you?"
Rosamund drew her into a little room leading out of the hall.
"Just one word, Irene," she said. "I know you are very fond of Agnes, and you are behaving splendidly to her; but you will think of Miss Frost and of Hughie. You will write to me once or twice a week, and afterward, you know, it is settled that you and I are both to meet at the Merrimans', where we are to spend one term together."
"You will endure it when I give you a piece of news. It is arranged that little Agnes comes also, and"----
"Oh, have you settled that, you darling?"
"Partly. And Miss Frost comes, too, as they want another governess; and your dear mother, who needs change, will spend the time with one of her sisters in Scotland. Now you know exactly what is before you, and I must be off. I trust you, Irene. You won't disappoint me? If I thought you could, I don't really know what would become of me."
Wonderful to relate, the holidays passed smoothly enough. Hughie was the sort of boy to be touched by Rosamund's words. No one had before appealed to him just in Rosamund's way. He found, too, considerable pleasure and interest on his own account at The Follies, for Lady Jane was singularly kind to him, and gave him a pony to ride, and he was permitted the rare indulgence of going with the gamekeeper into the woods to take his first lesson in partridge-shooting; but this came later on.
Meanwhile Miss Frost made a great effort to recover her self-control; but such an agony of jealousy had taken possession of the poor lady that she could scarcely bear to be in the society either of her pupil or her little sister. Irene exercised more and more influence over Agnes, and for a long time that influence was altogether for good. When the child asked simple questions Irene replied simply. She felt ashamed of her own want of knowledge on many particulars. She went regularly to church twice every Sunday because little Agnes thought that no living person could do otherwise. She did not at all want to go, and she trembled as much as ever when the choir sang, and when the place became hushed and people called themselves "miserable sinners," and looked so unconcerned and so well-dressed. But for the sake of Agnes she restrained herself, for Agnes' little, pale, calm face appeared not to think at all about the matter.