“You are to understand,” he replied, “that a person whom Miss Ladd employs to help her in teaching, cannot always presume to express his sentiments in speaking to the young ladies.” “If that means anything, Mr. Morris, it means that we are enemies.” “It means, Miss de Sor, that I am the drawing-master at this school, and that I am called to my class.” Francine returned to her room, relieved of the only doubt that had troubled her. Plainly no suspicion that she had overheard what passed between Mrs. Ellmother and himself existed in Alban’s mind. As to the use to be made of her discovery, she felt no difficulty in deciding to wait, and be guided by events. Her curiosity and her self-esteem had been alike gratified--she had got the better of Mrs. Ellmother at last, and with that triumph she was content. While Emily remained her friend, it would be an act of useless cruelty to disclose the terrible truth. There had certainly been a coolness between them at Brighton. But Francine--still influenced by the magnetic attraction which drew her to Emily--did not conceal from herself that she had offered the provocation, and had been therefore the person to blame. “I can set all that right,” she thought, “when we meet at Monksmoor Park.” She opened her desk and wrote the shortest and sweetest of letters to Cecilia. “I am entirely at the disposal of my charming friend, on any convenient day--may I add, my dear, the sooner the better?” CHAPTER XXXVII. “THE LADY WANTS YOU, SIR.” The pupils of the drawing-class put away their pencils and color-boxes in high good humor: the teacher’s vigilant eye for faults had failed him for the first time in their experience. Not one of them had been reproved; they had chattered and giggled and drawn caricatures on the margin of the paper, as freely as if the master had left the room. Alban’s wandering attention was indeed beyond the reach of control. His interview with Francine had doubled his sense of responsibility toward Emily--while he was further than ever from seeing how he could interfere, to any useful purpose, in his present position, and with his reasons for writing under reserve. One of the servants addressed him as he was leaving the schoolroom. The landlady’s boy was waiting in the hall, with a message from his lodgings. “Now then! what is it?” he asked, irritably. “The lady wants you, sir.” With this mysterious answer, the boy presented a visiting card. The name inscribed on it was--“Miss Jethro.” She had arrived by the train, and she was then waiting at Alban’s lodgings. “Say I will be with her directly.” Having given the message, he stood for a while, with his hat in his hand--literally lost in astonishment. It was simply impossible to guess at Miss Jethro’s object: and yet, with the usual perversity of human nature, he was still wondering what she could possibly want with him, up to the final moment when he opened the door of his sitting-room.