Turquoise and Ruby

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Meade L. T.. Turquoise and Ruby

Chapter One. Great Refusal

Chapter Two. For Helen of Troy

Chapter Three. A Startling Condition

Chapter Four. Agreed

Chapter Five. Five Important Letters

Chapter Six. Preparations for the Visit

Chapter Seven. Light Blue Silk

Chapter Eight. Break-Up Day

Chapter Nine. Three Sisters Consult Together

Chapter Ten. A Cosy Little Supper

Chapter Eleven. Reaction

Chapter Twelve. A Terrible Alternative

Chapter Thirteen. A Surprise Invitation

Chapter Fourteen. The Castle

Chapter Fifteen. The Seaside

Chapter Sixteen. A Scrumptious Day

Chapter Seventeen. Gathering Clouds

Chapter Eighteen. The Locked Drawer

Chapter Nineteen. Telltale Tracings

Chapter Twenty. An Exchange

Chapter Twenty One. A Forlorn Hope

Chapter Twenty Two. Do the Right Thing

Chapter Twenty Three. A Wonderful Dream

Chapter Twenty Four. Restitution

Отрывок из книги

The excitement of the school knew no bounds. Hazlitt Chase was not a house divided against itself. All the girls loved all the other girls. Hitherto, there had never been a split in the camp. This was partly caused by the fact that there were no really very young girls in the school. A girl must have passed her fourteenth birthday before she was admitted. Thus it was easy to enlist the sympathies, to ensure the devotion of the young scholars. They worked for an aim; that aim was to please Mrs Hazlitt. She wanted to prepare them for the larger school of life. She took pains to assure them that the sole and real object of education was this. Mere accomplishments were nothing in her eyes, but she desired her girls to find a place among the good women of the future. They must not be slatternly; they must not be vain, worldly-minded, but they must be beautiful – that is, as beautiful as circumstances would permit. Each gift was to be polished like a weapon for use in the combat which lay before them; for the battle they had to fight was this: they had, in their day and generation, to resist the evil and choose the good.

Now, Mrs Hazlitt very wisely chose heroes and heroines from the past to set before her girls, and she felt very much annoyed now that Nora Beverley should object to take the part of Helen of Troy – Helen, who, belonging to her day and generation, had been much tried amongst beautiful women, badly treated, harshly used; sighed for, longed for, fought over, died for by thousands. That this Helen, so marvellous, so – in some senses of the word – divine, should be criticised by a mere schoolgirl and considered unworthy to be represented by her, even for a few minutes, was, to the headmistress, nothing short of ridiculous. Nevertheless, she was the last person to wound any one’s conscience.

.....

“How quaint and old-fashioned!”

“She is about to take a somewhat old-fashioned part,” continued Brenda. “I don’t pretend to know the old stories as I ought to; you, sir, who are such a good Greek scholar, must have heard of the character of Helen of Troy.”

.....