To be a pupil in Miss Marr's school was a distinction in itself. "Why don't you give and write your name 'Mademoiselle Marr,' as you have a right to do?" asked one of Miss Marr's acquaintances, when the school was first started.

Miss Marr laughed; then she answered soberly, "When my father came to America, he made himself a legal citizen of the country and he fought in its battles. He never called himself, and he was never called by any one, 'Monsieur.'"

"Because he bore the title of General."

"Not at first,—not until he had earned it here. But I—I was born and brought up here, and I have been always Miss Marr here. Why should I now suddenly change to Mademoiselle?"

"Because it would be of benefit to your school. Americans are attracted by anything foreign, and Mademoiselle Marr's school would sound so much more distinguished than Miss Marr's school."

"Oh!" and Miss Marr flung up her hands impatiently; "I am a better American than these foolish people who like foreign titles so much. But they shall come to me, they shall send their children to Miss Marr's school. I am not going to begin with any little tricks,—to throw out any little bait to catch silly folk, for it is not such folk's patronage that I want. I am going to keep an honest school, and I shall start as I mean to go on."

The acquaintance sighed, and shook her head, and told all her friends how obstinate Miss Marr was, how she had been advised and how she had gone against the advice, and that the school wouldn't come to anything, would get no start as Miss Marr's school, whereas as Mademoiselle Marr's it would at once impress everybody.

But Miss Marr went on in her own way, and at the end of five years there was no school in all New York that had the kind of high reputation that hers had. It was, in a certain sense, the fashion, and yet it was not fashionable.

"It's that French way of hers, after all," said the acquaintance whose advice had not been taken; "it's that French way that she inherited from the General. Nobody had finer manners than General Marr, and he had the qualities of a leader, too, in some ways,—though he never could keep any money; and these qualities also his daughter inherits."

Miss Marr laughed at this explanation when she was told of it,—laughed, and declared that the only secret of her success lay in the fact that she liked her work, and put her whole heart into it. And I'm inclined to think she was right. If she got a start at first because she was General Marr's daughter, she held it and made much of it because she had character and purpose. She put her heart into her work, and that meant that she put the magic of her lively sympathy and interest into it; and if she had not possessed this character and purpose, she couldn't have done what she did, even if she had been the daughter of an even more distinguished man than General Marr. She had said in the beginning: "I am not going to model my school after any fashionable pattern, for I don't care to have what is called a fashionable school, and I don't solicit fashionable patronage. There are plenty of quiet, cultivated people in New York and elsewhere who, I am sure, want just such a school as I mean to have,—a sensible, honest school, that shall give a sensible, honest, all-round education." And she was right, as events proved. The quiet, cultivated people came forth at once to her support; and then the queerest thing happened,—the fashionable folk began to come forward too, and in such numbers that she couldn't accommodate half of them, and they, instead of accepting the situation, and going elsewhere at this crisis, patiently bided their time, waiting until a vacancy occurred. It will readily be understood that when things had come to this pass, it was considered a most decided distinction to be a pupil at Miss Marr's school.

It was just at the climax of this popularity, just before the beginning of a new year, that a certain young lady said to her younger sister,—

"Now, Dorothy"—

"Dorothea! Dorothea! I'm going to have my whole name, every syllable of it, to start off in New York with."

"Well, Dorothea, then; you must remember one thing about Miss Marr,—she won't put up with any of your flippant smartness."

"She needn't."

"But, Dorothea, you won't be punished, and you won't be allowed to argue, as you did at Miss Maynard's. It will be like this,—Miss Marr will let you go on and reveal yourself and all your faults without a word of comment, as she would if you were a guest; then if she finds that you or your faults are of the kind that she doesn't care to have in her school, she'll send you home. She says, you know, that her school is neither an infant school, nor a reform school,—that by the time girls are fifteen, they are young ladies enough to have some idea of good breeding, and if they haven't, they are not the sort of girls that she wants in her school. Now remember that, Dorothea."

"I never heard of a school-teacher putting on such airs as this Miss Marr does, in my life. It's always what she wants, what she expects, what she is going to do. I know I shall hate her!"

"Well, if this is the spirit that you propose to start with, it is very easy to foresee the result."

"I don't care."

"Now, Dorothea, you do care. Just think—your name has been on the list for a whole year for this vacancy; and it was your own idea, you know. Nothing would satisfy you but to go to Miss Marr's."

"Oh, I know, I know; don't preach, you dear Molly Polly! I'm not going to fly at Miss Marr and call her an old cat, if I think she's one."

"No, I should say not, but you mustn't fly at a good many things,—at certain rules and regulations, for instance,—and you mustn't take any saucy little liberties, such as you have been in the habit of taking at Miss Maynard's."

"Oh, not a liberty!" smiling and nodding at her elder sister. "I shall pull my face down like this"—drawing down her lips and lowering her eyes—"when I meet the great Miss Marr, and I shall say, in a little bit of a frightened voice like this, 'Oh, Miss Marr, Miss Marr, please don't shut me up in a dark closet and put me on bread and water, whatever I do.'"

"What a goose you are, Dorothy!" but the elder sister laughed.

"Dorothea! Dorothea! remember now it's to be Dorothea, and you must write Dorothea on the envelopes of your letters to me," was the swift protest.

Three days after this conversation, Dolly, or Dorothea Dering, sat waiting with her mother in a handsome but rather old-fashioned-looking parlor in a rather old-fashioned house in New York, for the appearance of its hostess, Miss Marr. Dolly had been fidgeting about, examining the ornaments on the tables and the pictures on the walls, with a mingled expression of curiosity and irritability on her face, when she caught the sound of a firm even footfall on the polished oak floor of the hall. The girl made a little face at this firm, even sound, and said to herself, "It's just like her,—old Madam Prim!"

In another moment the footsteps came to the threshold of the parlor, and Dolly looked across the room to see—Why, there was some mistake! This was one of the pupils, and no Madam Prim; and what a stylish girl, what a stunning plain gown! thought Dolly. The minute after, "the stylish girl in the stunning plain gown" was saying, "How do you do, Mrs. Dering?" and Mrs. Dering was saying, "How do you do, Miss Marr?"

Dolly almost gasped with astonishment. "This, Miss Marr! Why, she didn't look any older than Mary."

The fact was, that Miss Marr was seven years older than Mary Dering, who was only twenty-three; but Angelique Marr was one of those persons who never look their age. Though not childish or immature, she had a fresh girl's aspect. In looking at her, Dolly forgot all her little plans for saying or doing this or that. Miss Marr looking at her said to herself: "Poor child! how shy and awkward and overgrown she is!" and forthwith concluded that it would be better not to notice her much for a time, and therefore gave all her attention to the mother, bestowing a swift fleeting smile now and then upon the girl,—a young smile, like that of a comrade in passing. Dolly was out of all her reckoning; her program of word and action which she had so carefully arranged being completely destroyed by this surprise of personality,—this substitution of the "stylish girl in a stunning plain gown" for an old Madam Prim. So absorbed was she in these thoughts, she heard but vaguely what her mother was saying, and was quite startled when the moment of parting from her came, forgetting all the fine little airs and good-bye messages she had arranged. She was so dazed, indeed, that she seemed stupid, and impressed Miss Marr more than ever as shy and awkward and overgrown; and it was out of pity for this shyness that Angelique Marr, as the door closed upon Mrs. Dering, turned to Mrs. Dering's daughter with her sweetest and friendliest of young smiles, and said to her,—

"Would you like to come up to my little parlor and have a cup of chocolate with me before I show you your room?"

As Dolly accepted the invitation, she had an odd subdued sort of feeling, as if she had been invited to lunch with one of Mary's fine young lady friends; and this feeling, instead of wearing off, increased, as she found herself in the little parlor drinking the most delicious foamy chocolate from a delicate SÈvres cup, while her entertainer helped her to biscuit or extra lumps of sugar, telling, as she did so, a droll little story about her first lesson in chocolate brewing from an old French soldier,—a friend of her father.

Dolly listened and laughed, and felt more and more that she was being treated in a very grown-up way by a very grown-up young lady, and that she must be equal to the occasion; so she sat up in her chair with a great deal of dignity, and endeavored to say the proper things in the proper places, with a delightful sense that she was doing the thing as well as Mary. It was at this moment that some one knocked at the door; and at Miss Marr's "Come in," there appeared a tall youth, who cried out as he entered,—

"Well, Aunt Angel!"

"What! Victor?"

Then followed embraces and inquiries; and Dolly began to feel out of place, and the stranger that she was, when Miss Marr turned, smiled, begged her pardon, and introduced her to her nephew,—Victor Graham, who was just back from his vacation at Moosehead Lake. With the grace and tact that people called "that French way" of hers, Miss Marr managed to include Dolly in the conversation, and, finding that she had spent several summers at Kineo, the Moosehead Lake region, drew her out by clever questions to tell what she knew about it. And Dolly knew a great deal about it; she had paddled a canoe on the lake, she had caught fish and helped cook them on the shore, and she had camped out in the Kineo woods.

Victor Graham, tall as he was, was only sixteen,—a real boy who loved out-of-door sports,—and, delighted to find somebody who was so familiar with the charmed region he had just reluctantly left, was soon in the full swing of reminiscences and questions. Had she been to this place, did she know that point, etc., etc.? In short, he felt as if he had met a comrade, and he treated her as such,—as a boy like himself; and Dolly for the moment responded in the same spirit, and forgot her stiff dignity and young lady manners, patterned after her sister Mary's.

Miss Marr sat back in her chair, looking and listening and smiling. Dolly had not the least idea that she was reading, as one would read in a book, a little page of Dorothea Dering. But she was. Dolly, in talking to Victor, forgot, as I have said, her dignity and young-lady manners, and was the Dolly Dering who romped and raced and paddled and cooked at Moosehead Lake.

"Not so very awkward, and not shy at all, but a big overgrown girl, who may one day be an attractive woman, when she is toned down and less crude and hoydenish."

This was part of Miss Marr's reading as she looked and listened; and as Dolly, getting more excited with her subject, went on more glibly, her silent smiling listener thought,—

"A good deal of a spoiled child evidently, who has been used to having her own way and been laughed at for her smart sayings until she is quite capable, I fear, of being rude and overbearing, if not unfeeling on occasions. But I think there is good material underneath. We'll see, we'll see."

What would Dolly have said if she could have heard this criticism of Dorothea Dering? What would Mrs. Dering have said if she could have heard her daughter called capable of being rude and overbearing? What would Mary have said to the whole summing up,—Mary, who was not of the kind ever to have been spoiled by indulgence, who was finer and had better instincts than Dolly? Mary would have said, "Oh, Dolly, Dolly, what have I always told you?"

Just as Miss Marr came to the conclusion of these reflections, she looked up at the clock on the mantel, and gave a quick start. Victor, following the direction of her eyes, stopped the story of camp-life that he was telling, and jumped to his feet, saying,—

"Do excuse me, Aunt Angel; I'd no idea it was so late."

Dolly's face fell like a disappointed child, and she burst out impatiently,—

"Oh, finish the story, finish the story!"

Victor Graham gave her a glance of surprise; then, flushing a little, said gently,—

"This is Aunt Angel's busy hour; I'll finish the story some other time."

The blood mounted to Dolly's forehead. That glance of surprise pricked her sharply. It angered her too. Who was this boy to set his priggish manners above hers? And in hot rebellion, she cried out flippantly,—

"No, no, tell it now, tell it now! Ten minutes longer can't make much difference."

She had been accustomed to persist in this fashion at home; and beyond a "Dolly, how impolite!" or "Be quiet, Dolly!" spoken at the moment by father or mother or Mary, not much further notice was taken of her offence. But neither Miss Marr nor Victor made the slightest suggestion of a reproving comment now. They made no comment whatever. The boy simply stared at her a second, then lowered his eyes, showing clearly that he was embarrassed by the girl's rudeness. Miss Marr looked at her with an expression of wondering astonishment that was in itself a shock and a revelation to Dolly. There was not a particle of personal resentment in this expression; it was the wondering astonishment of a person who is regarding for the first time some strange new species of development. Dolly had hitherto gloried in her impertinence, as something witty and audacious. Now all at once she was made to see that to another person, and that person this "stylish girl in a stunning plain gown," this audacious impertinence looked vulgar. The shock of this revelation was so sudden to Miss Dolly that all self-possession deserted her, and again Miss Marr saw her apparently shy and awkward and speechless. The deep red flush that overspread her face at the same time added to the appearance of shyness, and pleaded for her more than words would have done.

"She'd be a jolly girl, if she didn't break up into such Hottentot ways. I wonder where she came from?" was Victor's inward reflection. His concluding reflection, as he went out of the house, was, "Wonder what Aunt Angel will do with her."

Aunt Angel wondered, too, as she accompanied Dolly up to the room that had been arranged for her; and as she wondered, she could not help thinking, "How glad I am the girl is going to have a room to herself, and not with any one of the other girls!"

The room was small, but it was charmingly furnished,—a little pink and white chamber, with all sorts of pretty contrivances for comfort and convenience. As Dolly looked about her, when Miss Marr closed the door upon her, she thought of what her mother had said, after inspecting the room the day before: "It isn't in the least like a boarding-school,—it is like a visitor's room, Dolly, as you will see."

And Dolly did see, but she was in no mood to enjoy the pretty details just then, for the sense of humiliation was weighing heavily upon her. In vain she tried to blow it away with the breath of anger,—to call Miss Marr "old Madam Prim," and Victor "that prig of a boy." Nothing of this kind availed to relieve her. Never in her life had she been so impressed by anybody as by Miss Marr, and she was also sure that she had also begun to impress Miss Marr, in her turn. And now and now!—and down on the pink and white bed Dolly flung herself in a paroxysm of mingled regret, rage, mortification, and disappointment, and, like the big, overgrown, undisciplined child that she was, sobbed herself to sleep.

The short October afternoon had come nearly to an end when she woke; and she looked about her in dismay. It must be late; and, springing up, she glanced at her watch. It was half-past four. At this moment she heard, in the hall outside, a murmur of girls' voices. One called, "Miss Marr;" and another said, "The Boston train was delayed, or I should have been here earlier."

Then followed a soft tinkle of laughter, a little tap of heels, and an opening and shutting of doors. Dolly, listening, knew what this meant,—knew that these girls were the late arrivals, the returning pupils.

"And they all know each other," she commented rather lonesomely and enviously, "and I shall dress myself and get down before them. I'm not going to enter a room full of strange girls, if I know it!"

Dolly's taste was generally excellent. She knew what to wear and when to wear it; but some mistaken idea of outshining those strange girls at the start took possession of her, and instead of putting on a gown suited to the occasion, she donned a fine affair,—a combination of old-rose cashmere and velvet, with rose ribbons at her throat. As she left the room in this finery, she saw a door farther down the hall open, and a tall slender girl, dressed with the severest simplicity, come forth.

One of those strange girls! And Dolly, as they met, stared at her, with her head in the air. But the strange girl, with a matter of course manner, gave a little courteous inclination of greeting as she passed, whereat Dolly grew rather red. "I wonder if that is the girl who talked about 'my train,'" thought Dolly. "I'll bet it is. She has a look like that girl I saw one day last spring with the Edlicotts at Papanti's dancing-school. I wonder what her name is."

As the girl ran lightly down the stairs, one of the maids came up. Dolly stopped her and asked, "Is that one of the pupils?"

"Yes, miss."

"What is her name?"

"Miss Hope Benham."