Explore "A Waif's Progress" by Rhoda Broughton on Textopian. Read with annotations and highlights.
Thus it was not the task-mistress, but a mere footman, whose approaching tread struck compunctious fear into the breast of the pseudo-student in the east gallery -- a footman who simply requested her presence in the morning-room, coupling with his message the information that Mrs. and Miss Aylmer were there.
This ambiguous piece of news was enough to drive Jutes and Angles from a mind on which they had a firmer clutch than could be said of Miss Ransome's. Mrs. and Miss Aylmer calling at half-past eleven in the morning! What could the infringement of what had been already impressed upon her as an iron law of Mrs. Tancred's life portend? With a sinking heart the vision of pig-tailed Meg making her abrupt exit from the Dower House schoolroom upon an obviously vamped-up errand presented itself once more to her inward sight. Had they come to complain of her for corrupting that gaping goose's mind?