Pembrose to meet her at the Bloomsbury Hostel and talk out
the expulsions. She found that lady alertly defensive, entrenched behind
expert knowledge and pretension generally. Her little blue eyes seemed
harder than ever, the metallic resonance in her voice more marked, the
lisp stronger. "Of course, Lady Harman, if you were to have some
practical experience of control----" and "Three times I have given these
girls every opportunity--_every_ opportunity."

"It seems so hard to drive these girls out," repeated Lady Harman.
"They're such human creatures."

"You have to think of the ones who remain. You must--think of the
Institution as a Whole."

"I wonder," said Lady Harman, peering down into profundities for a
moment. Below the great truth glimmered and vanished that Institutions
were made for man and not man for Institutions.

"You see," she went on, rather to herself than to Mrs. Pembrose, "we
shall be away now for a long time."

Mrs. Pembrose betrayed no excesses of grief.

"It's no good for me to interfere and then leave everything...."

"That way spells utter disorganization," said Mrs. Pembrose.

"But I wish something could be done to lessen the harshness--to save
the pride--of such a girl as Alice Burnet. Practically you tell her she
isn't fit to associate with--the other girls."

"She's had her choice and warning after warning."

"I daresay she's--stiff. Oh!--she's difficult. But--being expelled is
bitter."

"I've not _expelled_ her--technically."

"She thinks she's expelled...."

"You'd rather perhaps, Lady Harman, that _I_ was expelled."

The dark lady lifted her eyes to the little bridling figure in front of
her for a moment and dropped them again. She had had an unspeakable
thought, that Mrs. Pembrose wasn't a gentlewoman, and that this sort of
thing was a business for the gentle and for nobody else in the world.
"I'm only anxious not to hurt anyone if I can help it," said Lady
Harman.

She went on with her attempt to find some way of compromise with Mrs.
Pembrose that should save the spirit of the new malcontents. She was
much too concerned on account of the things that lay ahead of them to
care for her own pride with Mrs. Pembrose. But that good lady had all
the meagre inflexibilities of her class and at last Lady Harman ceased.

She came out into the great hall of the handsome staircase, ushered by
Mrs. Pembrose as a guest is ushered by a host. She looked at the
spacious proportion of