of defiance.

_'Was fuer ein Maedchen.'_ muttered the Fraeulein, blinking at that distant
figure, with her pale gray-green eyes.

Miss Pew pretended not to see the challenge in the girl's angry eyes. She
turned to her subordinate, Miss Pillby, the useful drudge who did a
little indifferent teaching in English grammar and geography, looked
after the younger girls' wardrobes, and toadied the mistress of the
house.

'Miss Pillby, will you be kind enough to show Ida Palliser the state of
her desk?' asked Miss Pew, with awe-inspiring politeness.

'She needn't do anything of the kind, 'said Ida coolly. 'I know the state
of my desk quite as well as she does. I daresay it's untidy. I haven't
had time to put things straight.'

'Untidy!' exclaimed Miss Pew, in her appalling baritone; 'untidy is not
the word. It's degrading. Miss Pillby, be good enough to call over the
various articles which you have found in Ida Palliser's desk.'

Miss Pillby rose to do her employer's bidding. She was a dull piece of
human machinery to which the idea of resistance to authority was
impossible. There was no dirty work she would not have done meekly,
willingly even, at Miss Pew's bidding. The girls were never tired of
expatiating upon Miss Pillby's meanness; but the lady herself did not
even know that she was mean. She had been born so.

She went to the locker, lifted the wooden lid, and proceeded in a flat,