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Miss Merivale's Mistake By: Henry Clarke (1853-1908) |
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MISS MERIVALE'S MISTAKE By MRS. HENRY CLARKE, M.A. [Illustration: PAULINE SAT DOWN IN THE LOW CHAIR BY THE WINDOW AND TOOK
UP THE PHOTOGRAPH FRAME.] CONTENTS CHAPTER
I. A STARTLING DISCOVERY
II. WOODCOTE
III. A VISIT TO KENTISH TOWN
IV. TOM AND RHODA MEET
V. "A MERRY HEART GOES ALL THE WAY"
VI. PAULINE'S DIPLOMACY
VII. APPLES OF SODOM
VIII. AN INVITATION
IX. PAULINE HAS HER SUSPICIONS
X. A CONFESSION
XI. POLLY SMITH
XII. CONCLUSION ILLUSTRATIONS PAULINE SAT DOWN IN THE LOW CHAIR BY THE WINDOW AND TOOK UP THE
PHOTOGRAPH FRAME. PAULINE LEANT AGAINST THE DRESSER AND WATCHED HER. HE STARED AT HER, NOT COMPREHENDING.
CHAPTER I. A STARTLING DISCOVERY.
Miss Merivale had not been paying much heed to the eager talk that was
going on between Rose and Pauline Smythe at the window. The long drive from Woodcote had made her head ache, and she was drowsily
wishing that Miss Smythe would get her the cup of tea she had promised,
when the sound of a name made her suddenly sit bolt upright, her kind old
face full of anxious curiosity. "Rhoda Sampson, the creature calls herself," Pauline was saying in her
clear, high pitched voice. "Her people live in Kentish Town, or somewhere
in the dim wilds about there. You would know it by just looking at her." "Does she come from Kentish Town every day?" asked Rose. "Three times a week. On the top of an omnibus, one may be sure. And she
imbibes facts from The Civil Service Geography all the way. I found the
book in her bag yesterday. I believe she wants to get into the Post Office
eventually. It is a worthy ambition." "Whom are you talking of, my dears?" asked Miss Merivale from her seat by
the fire. Pauline turned round with a little stare. Miss Merivale was so
quiet and unassuming a personage that she had got into the habit of
ignoring her. "Of Clare's new amusement, Miss Merivale," she said, with a
laugh. Her laugh, like her voice, was a trifle hard. "It was scientific
dressmaking when I was at Woodcote last, you remember, Rose dear. Now it
is a society. Clare is secretary." "But you spoke of some girl who came here," persisted Miss Merivale. Pauline lifted her delicately pencilled eyebrows. "Oh, that is Clare's
typewriter. She is part of the joke. If you saw Clare and her together
over their letters, you would think they were reforming the universe. It
hasn't dawned on poor Sampson yet that Clare will get tired of the whole
business in a month. It is lucky she has the Post Office to fall back on.
Clare is exactly what she used to be at school, Rose, 'everything by
starts and nothing long.' It amuses me to watch her." "She doesn't tire of you, Pauline," said Rose fondly. Pauline frowned a little. She did not care to be reminded, even by
foolish, flattering little Rose, that she was, in sober fact, nothing more
nor less than Clare's paid companion. "Oh, we get on," she said coolly. "We each leave the other to go her own
way in peace. And it suits Lady Desborough in Rome to say that Clare is
living with her old governess. People think of me as a spectacled lady of
an uncertain age, and everybody is satisfied. But you would like some tea.
I wish Clare was in. She isn't afraid of that gas stove. I am ashamed to
confess that I am. Come out with me while I light it, Rosamunda mia. And
you shall make the tea. I never can remember how many spoonfuls to put in.
How pretty you look in blue! I wish I was eighteen, with hair the colour
of ripe wheat, then I would wear blue too." She went off, laughing, with Rose to the tiny kitchen on the other side of
the passage. The sitting room was the largest room in the little Chelsea
flat, and that was smaller than any of the rooms at Woodcote; but the
diminutive dimensions of the place only added to the fascinations of it in
Rose's eyes. As she took the cups and saucers down from the toy like dresser and put
them on the lilliputian table between the gas stove and the door, she felt
a thrill of ineffable pleasure... Continue reading book >>
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Fiction |
Teen/Young adult |
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