"I am sure you ought not to go out; indeed, you can't." She looked up
at me imploringly. Suddenly she burst out crying.
"Oh Riki," I said, "what is the matter?"
"If you don't help me I shall be the most miserable girl in all the
world," she said. "And it is all your fault, too."
"My fault?" I cried. "Why, Riki, you must be mad. Whatever have I
done?"
"Well, you have told me about your so wonderful English customs, and I
have been taking them to my heart; and there is Heinrich--"
"Who is Heinrich--your brother?"
She stared at me, but made no reply.
"He was the person you wrote to, was he not?"
"Oh, hush, hush! Raise not your voice to that point; some one may come
in and hear."
"And why should not people hear? I must say English girls have secrets,
but not that sort," I said, with great indignation.
"You are so bitter and so proud," she said; "but you know not the
heart-hunger."
"Oh yes, I do!" I answered. I was thinking of my mother and her
miniature, and the fading image of that loved memory in the old home. I
also thought of the new step-mother. Yes, yes, I knew what heart-hunger
was. My tone changed to one of pity.
"I have felt it," I said.
"Oh, then, you have had your beloved one?"
"Indeed, yes."
"Did I not say that of all the school it was natural I should select you
to be to me a companion?"
"Can I help you?" I said.
"You can. Will you, as I am not allowed to go out, take this and put it
into a letter-box?"
"But I cannot make out why there should be any trouble."
"It is so easy, and Heinrich--the poor, the sad, the inconsolable--wants
to get it at once."
Again I was a remarkably silly girl; but I took Riki's letter and posted
it for her. She devoured me with kisses, and immediately recovered her
spirits.
The next day she was better and able to go out, and when she returned
home she presented me with a magnificent box of French bonbons. Now, I
was exceedingly partial to those sweets. Riki often came into our
little sitting-room, and all the girls began to remark on our
friendship.
"It is so unlike the Comtesse Riki to take up passionately with any one
girl!" said Rosalind when this sort of thing had been going on for a few
weeks and we were all talking of the Easter holidays.
The great point of whether I was to go home or not had not yet been
decided. Hermione knew she must remain at the school; Augusta would
probably do likewise.
Rosalind went on commenting on my friendship with Riki. After a pause
she said, "Of course, she has been at the school for some time; she
leaves in the summer."
"Oh!" I answered; "she told me that she would be here for another
year."
"I think it has been changed. She is not contented; the Baroness will
not keep a pupil in the school who shows discontent."
"But surely she is quite a nice girl?"
Rosalind was silent for a minute; then she said, "Perhaps I ought just
to warn you, Dumps. I wouldn't trouble myself to do so--for I make a
point of never interfering between one girl and another--but as you are
Lilian St Leger's friend, and have been specially introduced to me
through her, it is but fair to say that you ought to regard the German
girl from a different standpoint from the English one."
"Certainly the German girl is different," I said; and I laughingly
repeated some of Riki's conversation with me in the Bois de Boulogne.
"Think of any girl talking of _dots_, and being betrothed, and getting
married at her age!" I said.
"Oh, that isn't a bit strange," replied Rosalind; "they all do it.
These German girls get married very young, and the marriages are
arranged for them by their parents; they never have anything to say to
them themselves."
"Well, it is horrible," I said, "and I told her so."
"Did you?" said Rosalind very slowly. "Well, perhaps that accounts."
She looked very grave. After a minute she bent towards me and said in a
low tone--too low even for Hermione to hear--"Whatever you do, don't
post letters for her."