Gaunt, forbidding, full of purpose, she walked in, and set her candle
down beside the one that Dinah had been about to extinguish.
"Get up!" she said to the startled girl. "Don't sit there gaping at me!
I've come here to give you a lesson, and it will be a pretty severe one I
can tell you if you attempt to disobey me."
"What do you want me to do?" breathed Dinah.
She stood up at the harsh behest, but she was trembling so much that her
knees would scarcely support her. Her heart was throbbing violently, and
each throb seemed as if it would choke her. She had seen that inflexibly
grim look often before upon her mother's face, and she knew from bitter
experience that it portended merciless treatment.
Mrs. Bathurst did not reply immediately. She went to a little table in a
corner which Dinah used for writing purposes, and opened a blotter that
lay upon it. From this she took a sheet of note-paper and laid it in
readiness, found Dinah's pen, opened the ink-pot. Then, over her
shoulder, she flung a curt command: "Come here!"
Dinah went, every nerve in her body tingling, her face and hands cold as
ice.
Mrs. Bathurst glanced at her with a contemptuous smile. "Sit down, you
little fool!" she said. "Now, you take that pen and write at my
dictation!"
Dinah shrank at the rough words. She felt like a child about to receive
corporal punishment. The vindictive force of the woman seemed to beat her
down.
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