She had never been quite popular with the school in her previous role of fiancee, and only Octavia Dean and one or two older girls appreciated its mysterious fascination; while the beautiful Rupert, secure in his avowed predilection for the middle-aged wife of the proprietor of the Indian Spring hotel, looked upon her as a precocious chit with more than the usual propensity to objectionable "breathing." Nevertheless the master was irritatingly conscious of her presence--a presence which now had all the absurdity of her ridiculous love-experiences superadded to it.

He tried to reason with himself that it was only a phase of frontier life, which ought to have amused him.
But it did not.

The intrusion of this preposterous girl seemed to disarrange the discipline of his life as well as of his school.

The usual vague, far-off dreams in which he was in the habit of indulging during school-hours, dreams that were perhaps superinduced by the remoteness of his retreat and a certain restful sympathy in his little auditors, which had made him--the grown-up dreamer--acceptable to them in his gentle understanding of their needs and weaknesses, now seemed to have vanished forever.
At recess, Octavia Dean, who had drawn near Cressy and reached up to place her arm round the older girl's waist, glanced at her with a patronizing smile born of some rapid free-masonry, and laughingly retired with the others.

The master at his desk, and Cressy who had halted in the aisle were left alone.
"I have had no intimation yet from your father or mother that you were coming back to school again," he began.