Page:The time spirit; a romantic tale (IA timespiritromant00snaiiala).pdf/73

 at Broadwood House Academy it was impossible to subsist entirely on your social eminence. Ethel had openly sneered at the outsider upon her first intrusion in the fold; the only daughter of a very recent knight found it hard to breathe the same air as the offspring of a humble police constable. But Dame Nature, in her ignorant way, bungled the whole thing so miserably, that while Ethel was always very near the bottom of the class, Mary was generally at the top of it; Ethel was heavy and humorless, and inclined to take refuge in her dignity, Mary was bon enfant, with very little in the way of dignity in which to take refuge. And in proof of that, a story was told of her, soon after she passed the age of ten, which ran like wildfire throughout Broadwood House Academy.

It seemed that in the vicinity of Mary's undistinguished home were certain rude boys. Foremost among them was Mrs. Connor's Michael, the youngest and not the least vocal of her numerous progeny. And it often happened that Michael was en route from his own seat of learning, where manners did not appear to be in the curriculum, when Mistress Mary was on the way home from Broadwood House Academy, where manners undoubtedly were. In the opinion of Michael's mother the Connors were quite as good as the Kellys—very much better if it came to that!—and this tradition had been freely imbibed by her youngest hope. The Connors were quite as good as the Kellys, Michael was always careful to inform his peers, but the haughty beauty of Beaconsfield Villas, in her beaver hat and blue ulster with gilt buttons did not share that view. She had simply not