ate enough to roll
down her cheek, she heard a voice behind her.

"I say, Laura ... Laura!"--and there was Chinky, in her best white hat.

"I'm sitting with my aunt just a few rows down; but I couldn't make you
look. Can I come in next to you for a minute?"

"If you like," said Laura and, because she had to sniff a little, very
coldly: Chinky had no doubt also been a witness of her failure.

The girl squeezed past and shared her seat. "I don't take up much room."

Laura feigned to be engrossed in the game. But presently she felt her
bare wrist touched, and Chinky said in her ear: "What pretty hands
you've got, Laura!"

She buried them in her dress, at this. She found it in the worst
possible taste of Chinky to try to console her.

"Wouldn't you like to wear a ring on one of them?"

"No, thanks," said Laura, in the same repellent way.

"Truly? I'd love to give you one."

"You? Where would YOU get it?"

"Would you wear it, if I did?"

"Let me see it first," was Laura's graceless reply, as she returned to
her stony contemplation of the great sunlit expanse.

She was sure Miss Snodgrass, on getting home, would laugh with the
other governesses over what had occurred--if not with some of the
girls. The story would leak out and come to Tilly's ears; and Tilly
would despise her more than she did already. So would all the rest. She
was branded, as it was, for not having a single string to her bow. Now,
it had become plain to her that she could never hope for one; for, when
it came to holding a boy's attention for five brief minutes, she could
be put in the shade by a child of eight years old.

XVI.

Since, however, it seemed that some one had to be loved if you were to
be able to hold up your head with the rest, then it was easier,
infinitely easier, to love the curate. With the curate, no personal
contact was necessary--and that was more than could be said even of the
music-masters. In regard to them, pressures of the hand, as well as
countless nothings, were expected and enacted, in the bi-weekly reports
you rendered to those of your friends who followed the case. Whereas
for the curate it was possible to simulate immense ardour, without
needing either to humble your pride or call invention to your aid: the
worship took place from afar. The curate was, moreover, no unworthy
object; indeed he was quite attractive, in a lean, ascetic fashion,
with his spiritual blue eyes, and the plain gold cross that d