slation of that ode," he said, "into something quite like the
original metre":

"'How unhappy is the maiden who with Cupid may not play,
And who may not touch the wine cup, but must listen all the day
To an uncle and the scourging of his tongue'"

"Come now, Canon," I said, "Lalage is a precocious child, I know. But
she won't feel those particular deprivations yet awhile. She didn't try
to flirt with Tom Kitterick, did she?"

"It's all the same thing really," said the Canon. "The confinement and
discipline will be just as severe on her as they were on that girl of
Horace's, though, of course, they will take a different form. She's
been accustomed to a good deal of freedom and independence."

"According to the Archdeacon," I said, "to more than was good for her."

"I couldn't help that."

"No, you couldn't. Nobody could. My mother thinks Miss Pettigrew may,
but I don't believe it myself. Lalage will break out all right as soon
as she gets a chance."

For the first time since we left the station the Canon smiled and seemed
a little more cheerful.

"If I thought that----" he said.

"You may be perfectly sure of it, but I don't think you ought actually
to hope it. The Archdeacon is a very wise man and I'm sure that, if he
contemplates the possibility at all, he fears it."

"I suppose so," said the Canon, sighing again. "It will all be a great
change for Lalage, whatever happens."

CHAPTER IV

I feared at first that Lalage was not going to write to me. Nearly three
weeks passed before I got a letter from her and I was inclined to
blame her for neglect of an old friend. When the letter did arrive I
imderstood that I had no right to be angry. Lalage was better than I had
dared to hope. She kept a kind of irregular diary in an exercise book
and sent it to me. It was, like all diaries, in disconnected paragraphs,
evidently written down when the mood for recording experiences was on
Lalage. There were no dates attached, but the first entry must, I think,
embody the result of a very early series of impressions. One, at least,
of the opinions expressed in it was modified later on:

"When I arrived I was hustled into a room by a small fat lady dressed in
purple; not the old Pet, which is what we call Miss Pettigrew. I waited
for ten minutes. Then I was hustled upstairs by the same purple-clothed
lady, and shown a locker, Number 73. There I stayed for about five
minutes and then was driven down ag