"It is a miserable custom, Ellen Roper," retorted Miss Chandos. "When the Stapletons were passing through Nulle last spring, they invited me to the hotel for a day, and Mademoiselle Barlieu put her veto upon it, because their name had not been given in by mamma. Lady Stapleton came and expostulated; said her husband, Sir Gregory, was the oldest friend possible of the late Sir Thomas Chandos, had been for years, and that they would take every imaginable care of me, and she knew Lady Chandos would wish me to go. Not a bit of it; you might as well have tried to move the house as to move Mademoiselle Barlieu. Miladi Chandos had not given her the name, she said, and she could not depart from the usual custom. Don't you remember what a passion I was in? Cried my eyes out, and would not do a single devoir. Anne Hereford, you can write home and ask them to give in some names to Miss Barlieu." Home! What home had I to write to? CHAPTER IX. A STEP IRREVOCABLE. There was war between the English governess and Emily Chandos. Emily was excessively popular; with her beauty, her gaiety, and her generous wilfulness; she did nearly what she liked in the school—except of course with the Miss Barlieus. For myself, I had learnt to love her. She had her faults—what girl is without them? She was vain, petulant, haughty when displeased, and a little selfish. But she possessed one great gift of attraction—that of taking hearts by storm. Miss Johnstone began by a mistake: the striving to put down Miss Chandos. She was over-strict besides with her lessons and exercises; and more than once reported her to Miss Annette for some trifling fault, magnified by her into a grave one. The girls espoused Emily's cause; and Miss Johnstone grew to be regarded, and also treated, with contempt. It vexed her greatly; and there were other things. Her name was Margaret. But she had incautiously left an open letter about, in which she was repeatedly called "Peg." Of course that was quite enough for the girls, and they took to call her Peg, almost in her hearing. A new English pupil, who entered as weekly boarder, went up at the English dictation and addressed her as "Miss Pegg," believing it to be her real name. You should have seen Miss Johnstone's dark and angry face, and the dancing eyes of Emily Chandos. Madame de Mellissie had left for Paris; but her son, Monsieur Alfred, remained at Nulle—his attraction being, as the girls said openly, Emily Chandos. Emily laughed as she listened: but denial she made none. They said another thing—that the beautiful hearts-ease ring she wore had been his love-gift: and still there was no express denial. "Have it so if you like," was all Emily said. "She cannot think _seriously_ of him, you know," Ellen Roper observed one day. "It is a match that could never be allowed by her family. He is quite a second-rate sort of Frenchman, and she is Miss Chandos of Chandos. He is a bit of a jackanapes too, vain and silly."