In this position she remained, thinking over her past conduct with the Frenchman. Perhaps she had been too forward with him from the first. He must think her a very bold, rude girl,—oh, yes, that he must. She ought never to have been a party to his secreting himself in the music-room. Yes! yes! she had behaved very imprudently and wrong all through, though she would never acknowledge as much to Miss Wewitz;—no! not if she was to be torn to pieces by a thousand wild horses. Then the young lady only wished she could go over it all again; she’d be as cold and distant with him as ever that prosy old methodist preacher of a Mentor, in that horrid Telemachus, could have desired any young lady to be. Suddenly, she was awakened from her reflections by a gentle tapping at the window. Had the noise been louder, Miss Chutney would have favoured the inmates of Parthenon House with one of her best shrieks; but as it was, the sound was so slight, that it was not until repeated several times that the young lady even noticed it. It was like the beak of a bird pecking against the glass, or the twig of an adjacent tree blown against the window,—and yet there was nothing to be seen. Miss Chutney rose from her seat and moved a few steps towards the casement, when there suddenly appeared outside the top joint of a fishing-rod. Instinctively she drew back, and, still watching the mysterious implement, she saw it swing to and fro, while presently the line which dangled from the tip of it was jerked into the room, and deposited on the floor a three-cornered pink note, fastened to the hook. Without a thought, and almost mechanically, as it were, Miss Chutney ran forward and put her foot upon the letter, when, the line being detained, the top joint of the rod outside was seen to bend, until at last the hook tore its way through the paper, and being suddenly released sprung back again out of the window. For some little time Miss Chutney stood still, looking at the epistolary triangle, half afraid to raise it. It was from the Frenchman, she felt assured, and she ought to have nothing to do with it; it would only be encouraging him. She’d send it back to him—but how? thought she, the moment afterwards. If she threw it from the window, it must fall into the playground, that was certain; and then Wewitz, with her hawk’s eyes, would get hold of it, and be sure to blame her all the more; and if she went to the window and made signs to the man that she wanted him to take the letter back, of course he’d pretend he didn’t understand her, and would be certain to get kissing his hand to her, and all that nonsense; so it would be better to let it lie where it was—and lie there it might for her, for she wasn’t going to read it, she was sure.