Page:Elizabeth Jordan--Tales of the city room.djvu/180

 little pedestals. How do we know what environment and temptations she may have had? How do we know what we should have done if we had been in her place? I shall certainly continue to love her and to tell her so. And if the uplifting influence of my society will help her," ended the girl more lightly, "she shall have all that I have time to give her."

She crossed to the piano and drifted into the rhythmic melody of the Twelfth Nocturne, while Mrs. Ogilvie leaned her cheek against the unresponsive wood of the instrument and listened. From her comfortable rest on the big divan Miss Neville took up the discussion.

"You were always something of a prig, Virginia," she said, with vivacious bluntness. "But you 're fairly distinguishing yourself to-night. You 're not talking to Park Row. You 're talking to Miss Bertram's friends."

Miss Imboden flushed a little.

"I don't forget that I'm speaking to my own friends, too," she said with dignity. "If you have any idea that I would say these things to anybody else, banish it."