And the lady principal returned to say very much the same thing over again to the next teacher whom she summoned. But Katharine, who had long since learnt to regard her insincerity as inevitable, merely congratulated herself on the practical results of her interview, and thoroughly enjoyed the contest that ensued when her new pupils found they were going to be taught by a junior mistress. She felt very elated when she came out of it victorious; and for the next week or two everything seemed to go well with her. She had made a position for herself, although every one had told her it would be impossible; there were people who believed in her thoroughly, and there were others, like Ted and Phyllis Hyam, who did not understand her but worshipped her blindly. It was all very gratifying to her, after the dull month she had spent at home; and for the first time she threw off the reserve she usually showed, though unconsciously, towards the working gentlewomen of Queen's Crescent, and talked about herself in a way that astonished them not a little. Work to them was a sordid necessity, and they were a little jealous of this brilliant girl, with the youth and the talent, who found no difficulty in winning success where they had barely earned a living, and who seemed to enjoy her life into the bargain. "Who is that girl with the jolly laugh and the untidy hair?" she overheard a stranger asking Polly Newland one day. "That one?" was the reply, given in a contemptuous tone. "Oh, she's a caution, I can tell you! Nice? Oh, I dare say! She's a prig, though. Phyllis Hyam--that's the other girl in our room--thinks all the world of her; but I can't stand prigs, myself." It was a little shock to her self-esteem to hear herself described so baldly, though she consoled herself by the reflection that Polly had never liked her, and there was consequently very little value to be attached to her opinion. But she was careful to remain silent about her own affairs for the next day or two; and she startled Ted, one evening, by asking him suddenly, between the acts of a melodrama, what was meant by a "prig." "A prig? Oh, I don't know! It's the same thing as a smug, isn't it?" "But what is a smug?" "Well, of course, a smug is--well, he's a smug, I suppose. He hasn't got to be anything else, has he? He's a played-out sort of bounder, who wants to have a good time and hasn't the pluck, don't you know?" "Are all prigs bounders?" asked Katharine, in a voice of dismay. "Oh, I expect so! It doesn't matter, does it? At least, there's a chap in our office who is a bit of a prig, and he isn't a bounder exactly. He's a very decent sort of chap, really; I don't half mind him, myself. But they always call him a prig because he goes in for being so mighty saintly; at least, that's what they say. I don't think he is so bad as all that, myself." "Is it priggish to be good, then? I thought one ought to try."