kept on their white headdresses in the house, and why the
girls all made their little _reverence_ when Mother Bradley
came out to meet us. She kissed Margarita so sweetly and
held her in her arms a moment--I don't think Roger quite
realised how his attitude hurts her: it is the only almost
unjust thing I ever knew him to do. In the halls there is a
great statue of Christ blessing the children, and Margarita
stopped and stared at it several minutes, while we watched
her. She seemed so rapt that Mary took my hand excitedly and
whispered to me not to disturb her for the world, but wait
for what she would say. After a while she turned to me.

"Why has that woman a beard, Sue?" she asked cheerfully.
Imagine my feelings! I did not dare look at Mary.

We went all through the school-rooms and she was most
curious about the globes and blackboards and pianos. We
stopped at the door of a tiny music room, and I smiled, as I
always do, at the pretty little picture. The young girl with
her Gretchen braids of yellow hair, straight-backed in front
of the piano, the nervous, grey-haired little music master
watchfully posted behind her, beating time, and in the
corner the calm-faced Sister, pink-cheeked under her
spreading cap, knitting, with constantly moving lips. The
music rooms are so wee that the group seemed like a
gracefully posed _genre_ picture. Before we knew what she
was about, Margarita had slipped in behind the music master
and brought both hands down with a crash on the keys, so
that the Chopin Prelude ended abruptly in an hysterical wail
and the young lady half fell off the stool--only half, for
Margarita pushed her the rest of the way, I regret to say.
Fortunately Mary was able to get us out of it, but I fear
there was no more Prelude that day! Why will women play
Chopin, by the way? I never heard one who could--Aus der Ohe
is masculine enough, heaven knows, but even that amount of
talent doesn't seem to accomplish it. Do you remember
Frederick's diatribes on the subject? He used to say that
Congress should forbid Chopin to women, on pain of life
imprisonment.

[Illustration: MARGARITA STOPPED AND STARED AT IT SEVERAL MINUTES]

But you must hear the end of the visit. We went into Mary's
room--perfectly bare, you know, with a gre