She ate it very slowly, anxious to make it last as long as possible, for she felt that when it was finished she should not know what to do with herself.

When even the crumbs were gone she folded her hands and counted the flowers on the wall-paper, and discovered among them a grinning face which certainly had been no acquaintance of the designer's, but had started suddenly out of the pattern merely to make cruel fun of Hetty's uneasiness.
At last, after some time which seemed to the little girl quite a year at least, Mrs.Enderby rang the bell and asked if the young ladies had come in from walking.

The servant said they were just going to tea in the school-room, and Mrs Enderby turned to Hetty, saying: "Go, my dear, with Peter, and he will show you the school-room.

Tell Phyllis and Nell that I sent you to play with them." Hetty followed the servant; but as she went across the hall and up the staircase she felt with a swelling heart that had she been the real cousin of these children, and not an "upstart" (Grant's favourite word), they would perhaps have been sent for to the drawing-room to be presented to her.
Accustomed as she was to be alternately petted and snubbed, she had acquired the habit of watching the movements of her elders with suspicion, and now concluded that because no fuss was made about her she must therefore be despised.

A hard proud spirit entered into her on the moment, and she resolved that though she had been humble in her demeanour towards Mrs.Enderby she would hold her head high with girls who were not very much older than herself.
Peter was a young footman who had been brought up in the village and trained by the butler at the Hall, and who consequently knew all about Hetty's history.