Loyal to the School

BLACKIE & SON LIMITED
50 Old Bailey, London
17 Stanhope Street, Glasgow

BLACKIE & SON (INDIA) LIMITED
Warwick House, Fort Street, Bombay

BLACKIE & SON (CANADA) LIMITED
1118 Bay Street, Toronto

"IT'S WONDERFULLY GOOD"
[Page 151]
Frontispiece

Loyal to the School
BY
ANGELA BRAZIL
Author of "Monitress Merle"
"A Fortunate Term" "For the School Colours" &c.
Illustrated by H. L. Bacon
BLACKIE & SON LIMITED
LONDON AND GLASGOW

By Angela Brazil

• My Own Schooldays.

• Ruth of St. Ronan's.
• Joan's Best Chum.
• Captain Peggie.
• Schoolgirl Kitty.
• The School in the South.
• Monitress Merle.
• Loyal to the School.
• A Fortunate Term.
• A Popular Schoolgirl.
• The Princess of the School.
• A Harum-Scarum Schoolgirl.
• The Head Girl at the Gables.
• A Patriotic Schoolgirl.
• For the School Colours.
• The Madcap of the School.
• The Luckiest Girl in the School.
• The Jolliest Term on Record.
• The Girls of St. Cyprian's.
• The Youngest Girl in the Fifth.
• The New Girl at St. Chad's.
• For the Sake of the School.
• The School by the Sea.
• The Leader of the Lower School.
• A Pair of Schoolgirls.
• A Fourth Form Friendship.
• The Manor House School.
• The Nicest Girl in the School.
• The Third Form at Miss Kaye's.
• The Fortunes of Philippa.

Printed in Great Britain by Blackie & Son, Ltd., Glasgow

Contents

Illustrations

LOYAL TO THE SCHOOL

CHAPTER I
New Lamps

"The fault I find with the Kingfield High School," proclaimed Kathleen Wilcox, squatting on the top of a boot locker, and putting on a new pair of patent leather house shoes with a deliberate eye to their effect upon her surrounding friends and foes, "the fault I find—yes, I do find fault and I shall, Lesbia Ferrars, though you are the oldest pupil and take the school under your wing! You needn't make round eyes at me like that! I don't care twopence for your glares! Well, as I was saying—and I won't be interrupted—the fault I find with the Kingfield High School is that it's not nearly go-ahead enough. If you ask me I think it's dropping behind the times!"

"Dropping behind the times!" echoed Phillis Marsh in open-mouthed amazement.

"How far do you want it to go?" retorted Lesbia Ferrars, metaphorically picking up the glove and accepting combat. "It's as decent as any other school and nicer than most. Some people never know when they're well off! If you went to the King's College now you'd have twice the home work. Perhaps that's what you're hankering after? They're go-ahead in the matter of work, if you like, at King's!"

"No more home work for me thanks," put in Etta Pearson hurriedly. "Kathleen may take my share of it and welcome if her tastes run that way."

Kathleen leisurely put down two elegant feet from the locker, reviewed them with a glance of conscious satisfaction, then, grasping mental sword and buckler, condescended to explain herself.

"What a set of lunatics you are!" she said compassionately. "You're not bright, any of you, or you'd have twigged my meaning at once. Of course I don't want any more home work piled on our shoulders. I—of all people—to suggest that! Great Scott! What I do mean is that it's just lessons, lessons, lessons, eternally lessons, and not enough outside things. Some schools have all sorts of jolly clubs, and we've hardly a single decent society except the G. G. I. S. And what's that good for?"

"Good for nothing!" snorted Calla Wilkins scornfully.

"Well, it's all there is anyhow, and though some people may like to sit doing crochet while a teacher drones away reading an improving book, it's not in my line. I call it dull."

"Dull as ditch-water!" agreed Etta Pearson, with unction.

"We got through a whole heap of bazaar work at the G. G. I. S. though," objected Lesbia, who, though half sympathizing, felt bound to stick to her guns in the argument.

"I daresay we did! But even you can't pretend you enjoyed that rubbishy book Miss Yates used nearly to go to sleep over. I call it an insult to our intellects to read us such absolute 'bread and milk' twaddle!"

"I told Miss Yates we didn't like the book," admitted Lesbia.

"Yes, and she nearly snapped your head off and said you were always grumbling," added Calla. "I remember how she jumped on you."

"Well, to go back to my point," continued Kathleen, "here we are on the first day of a new school year. At any other school there'd have been great times. The 'King's' girls meet in the big lecture hall and have speeches and arrange all the clubs for the winter. That's what I call a 'coming back'. We don't come back, we only ooze back. We hang about on the stairs till a teacher says 'Oh, my dear, you're moved into Vb', or whatever the form is. There ought to be a proper reading out of the lists in the gym. Then each form would march to its own room and the thing would be done decently and in order. We're utterly and absolutely old-fashioned, and behind the times. That's what's the matter with the Kingfield High School."

"Humph! Something the matter with your own eyes I should say!" sniffed Aldora Dodson, who had just joined the group. "What about that notice stuck up in the hall?"

"What notice?"

"What notice?" mimicked Aldora. "You don't mean to tell me you all walked past it like blind bats, when it was there as large as life, and actually staring you in the face! If you want to know what it's about go and look at it! I can't waste my time telling you things you're too lazy to read for yourselves."

Aldora's advice, though administered in an uncomplimentary fashion, was sound. Without further parley the girls took it. They hurried from the cloakroom and tore into the hall, to discover the truth for themselves. Quite a crowd was collected round the notice board. It took a little while to elbow their way through. When at last they reached vantage spots, where by dint of craning their necks they could see between or over the heads of those in front of them, their eyes encountered a home-made poster, so large and conspicuous that it was certainly very extraordinary that they should have passed it by unnoticed.

The school will assemble
in the
GYMNASIUM
at 2.30

when the new form lists will be read, and various new arrangements will be explained.

M. Tatham.

"Hold me up! I'm fainting!" exclaimed Kathleen. "New? Did my eyes deceive me or are we actually going to have something new? Wonders will never cease."

"Good old Tatie!" purred Lesbia. "She's turning up trumps to-day."

"Don't congratulate yourself too soon, my child," admonished Calla, "you don't know yet what the new arrangements are."

"Take me to the gym at once," commanded Kathleen tragically. "I must have a front seat and know the best or worst. I'm simply palpitating till I hear. Are we to study Sanscrit or start a Cosy Café to supply refreshments at eleven? Tell me which, I beseech you. I can't wait."

"Come along, you mad thing," laughed Lesbia. "We're none of us any wiser than you are. Miss Tatham has got a surprise packet to spring on all of us, that's evident enough. Trust her to let nothing leak out beforehand. She's an absolute Freemason for secrecy."

"Well, if it's Sanscrit, I leave the school, so I give everybody fair warning," chirruped Kathleen, hanging heavily on to Lesbia's arm in an affectation of flutter.

"And if it's a Cosy Café you'll spend all your pocket money there and make yourself ill into the bargain. I know you! Look here, I'm going to drop you! My arm's breaking. You must weigh ten stone if you weigh a pound."

Though the girls laughed and joked as they walked along the glazed covered passage, they sobered down and straightened their faces as they entered the gymnasium. Benches and chairs were arranged here in rows, and were already partly filled with pupils of all ages, from small children in the preparatory forms to tall students of seventeen. Teachers hovered about, restraining excessive conversation, and a few monitresses were distributing books for the opening hymn. Miss Bates, the music teacher, was beckoning to members of the singing-class to come and sit near the piano and form an impromptu choir. Kathleen, somewhat to her bewilderment, was thus pounced upon and borne off to a seat of honour below the platform, where, separated from her own chums, she sat with a rather martyred expression among stars of the Sixth noted for their qualities of voice production. Her anxiety for change was certainly being amply gratified, though she was still doubtful of the extent of the proposed alterations.

The fact of the whole matter was that Miss Tatham, the head mistress, had taken the opportunity during the holidays of attending an educational conference, where she had come in contact with very modern views and fresh schemes of school government. She had returned to Kingfield bristling with ideas, and anxious to test many various theories which had been aired at the meetings. She was a broad-minded woman, and able to steer successfully between being a crank or faddist on the one hand, or a "stick-in-the-mud" on the other. For some time she had been conscious that the school needed rousing up, and now that she had been shown the way she meant to use her opportunities.

She stepped on to the platform at 2.30 with the satisfactory feeling of an architect who has completed a fresh design and has collected his stores of building material.

A dead hush marked her entrance, and immediately all attention was concentrated on her pale intellectual face and dark shining eyes. She possessed sufficient magnetic personality, apart from her office of principal, to rivet the interest of her three hundred girls. With other mistresses they might fidget or even whisper, but during her speeches or classes the bond between teacher and pupil was absolute.

She began very quietly by welcoming them back to school, spoke a few special words to newcomers, and read out the lists of the various forms, their teachers, and the names of visiting masters and mistresses for extra classes. These preliminaries settled, she "got to business", as Kathleen afterwards expressed it.

"I have been thinking lately," she said, "that we might with advantage try a new plan at school. You come here to be educated. Now, that does not mean simply to be crammed with facts, but to be taught the very best and highest possible way of self development. Certain facts must, of course, be mastered, and to learn them is a good discipline for training the mind, but the main point to be aimed at in education is to teach you a real love of intellectual things. I realize that tastes differ very much, and that what is an absorbing study for one girl may lack all interest for another. Life is not long enough to give time to everything, and it is better to concentrate our attention on certain things that appeal to our particular temperaments than to have a smattering of many 'ologies. I have decided, therefore, to set aside two afternoons in the week for what I may call 'self-expression'. There will be certain activities offered you, and you will each be allowed to choose which you wish to follow. I consider that two sides of our natures which need very careful training are the emotional and the mental. I am going to give an afternoon to each.

"By our emotional nature I mean that side of us which takes delight in art, music, and the drama. It shows itself early in very little children, who will often try to draw, sing, and act almost as soon as they can talk. If properly cultivated it is a most important part of self-expression. On one afternoon I am arranging to organize meetings in various branches of art, music, and acting. These are to be quite different and apart from your ordinary drawing or music lessons. You will work at what you wish, and in your own way, though an expert teacher will be there whom you can consult in any difficulty. I make one stipulation—that you must each choose your own subject for the term, and stick to it. I cannot allow chopping and changing. In the studio you will be given facilities for wood-carving, modelling, stencilling, painting, leatherwork, and other handicrafts. Those who wish to take up this branch must put down their names on the Arts List.

"Some of you, perhaps, may have no particular talent for what is called 'creating in material', that is, making beautiful objects in wood, leather, or clay, or with paints or pastels, but you can create in other ways. Beautiful sounds give as much pleasure as beautiful sights. I want us to revive the school orchestra and learn to play some good music. Those who can sing well are to be given a special opportunity of creation. This summer I went to the Glastonbury Musical Festival and heard one of the wonderful song-dramas which are produced there. A song-drama is a play which is both sung and acted, quite different from grand opera or musical comedy, and with a charm all its own. It corresponds in music to the Elizabethan or the Greek drama, for it is shown with scarcely any scenery, and on the simplest of stages, but its quality appeals to the very highest emotions. My hope is that we can get up a short song-drama for a Christmas performance, and that the orchestra should play the music for it. Those girls who can act, but not sing, will be given a separate opportunity to exercise their talents.

"Now, this is all on the emotional side of our natures, but we want also to cultivate the mental side. On our other 'self-expression afternoon' you will have a choice of various intellectual hobbies. We will have one department for studying nature, another for recording all the old legends and ancient customs of our city, a geographical society to trace our roads and streams, and a literary society for those who wish to try to write. Of course, you can't belong to them all at once, and you must choose what you like the best, but I think in such a wide field of choice every girl will surely find something to suit her, which she can work at as 'a labour of love'. The alternatives will be posted up in your form rooms, and you must put down your names by Friday afternoon, so that we can start next week. Don't choose in too big a hurry, but take time to think it over—for once made you'll have to abide by your choice."

There was a tremendous clapping at the close of Miss Tatham's speech. The idea of "self-expression" appealed to most of the girls, and even the little ones, who did not quite understand what it all meant, saw visions of pleasant afternoons and possible fun in store for them. The coming term seemed to offer prospects such as the school had never held before. As the new members of Va filed upstairs to their form they could not refrain from a few comments. Talking in the passages, though repressed by the mistresses, was not absolutely on the list of forbiddens at Kingfield High School, so the girls made discreet use of the privilege whenever possible.

"Well! What d'you think of it all?" inquired Calla, eagerly questioning the group nearest to her. "I call it ripping."

"Very enterprising of Tatie," conceded Kathleen graciously. "I really shouldn't have thought her capable of it. Where's she been in the holidays to get her ideas so shaken up? We must send her there again if things flag."

"Bags me the orchestra," piped Aldora.

"Oh, the song-drama appeals to me!" squeaked Marjorie Johns.

"'Sh, 'sh! 'Sh, 'sh!" came from the background, as a warning that Miss Pratt, their new form mistress, intended to insist on discipline, and rules or no rules would not countenance a chattering rabble under her very nose if she were obliged to act as escort. Remembering school etiquette the girls restrained their voices in the presence of the teacher, and falling into line marched into Va with due decorum, though once inside the door, with Miss Pratt still outside in the passage, there was a brief and wild scramble for the best desks, and Aldora Dodson had almost pushed Lesbia Ferrars out of a coveted seat when the entrance of authority restored order.

Lesbia, quite upset and panting from the fray, immediately put her books inside the desk as a sign of possession, and scribbling her name on a gummed label pasted it on to the lid rather ostentatiously, with an eye of triumph in the direction of Aldora, who pretended to take no notice. It meant much to Lesbia to secure that particular desk. She had always marked it for her own. As a junior she had often peeped into the room and had made up her mind that if she were ever moved so high up the school as Va she should like to sit in the seat next the window. The Kingfield High School did not adopt the horrible system of coating the glass with white paint, so there was a clear and uninterrupted view over walls, and across gardens, to the winding river and yellowing woods beyond. Lesbia's æsthetic soul felt that that view would compensate for many disagreeable things that would probably happen in the course of the coming year. She was not particularly clever at lessons, and might expect future squalls. To look over such a landscape would be a comfort after Miss Pratt's chidings. Miss Pratt had a reputation in the school for tartness of manner, though she was an excellent teacher. Her voice, sharp-clipped, business-like, and unconciliatory, grated upon Lesbia, who was very sensitive to sounds. Poor Lesbia was at the difficult age when we are sensitive in many respects. The trouble was that most people called her "thin-skinned". There are always two ways of describing the same characteristic. But as Lesbia, with all her faults and virtues, is going to be our heroine she had better have a chapter quite to herself.

CHAPTER II
The Oldest Pupil

Though Lesbia Ferrars might not be gifted with a good memory, or a mathematical brain, or a talent for languages, or even a great capacity for work, or any other special attribute to place her among the stars of her form, in one solitary respect she could always score over the rest of the school. She was the oldest pupil. Not indeed in years—there is an immense shade of difference between oldest and eldest—for she was not yet sixteen, while Rose Stirling and Mabel Andrews in the Sixth were approaching their eighteenth birthdays. She happened to have been longer at the school than anybody else. She had joined as a tiny child, and the contemporaries of her first year had all left. Even Theodora Johnson, the head girl, who could boast a nine years record, had to yield precedence to Lesbia in a question of "oldest inhabitant". It was a point upon which Lesbia prided herself immensely. Ever since she had been the baby of the kindergarten she had loved the school with a great loyalty, and was prepared to stand up for its merits against all detractors. It had become such a point of honour with her that she was almost stubborn about it, and would have waged its battles as blindly as the traditional cavalier who fought for the crown though it hung in a bush.

Lesbia, at fifteen and three-quarters on the great clock of life, was a rather picturesque little person, slim and not over-tall, with large dreamy eyes that held shining sparks when she laughed, and brown hair with a curl in it, and teeth that seemed more like a first set than a second, they were so small and even. The outside of her might have belonged indifferently to north, south, east, or west, but the inside of her was Celtic to the core. Both Irish and Highland blood ran in her veins, and unknown ancestors had handed down to her that heritage of laughter and tears, that joyous zest of life and keen intensity of feeling, that fairy glamour which may transfigure the commonest things, or beguile the heart to waste its devotion upon trifles, which is the birthright of those whose forbears, in the dim forgotten twilight of our island's history, kept their courts at Tara and Camelot and left their wealth of legend behind them.

Lesbia lived in a house in Denham Terrace with her stepbrother Paul Hilton. Fate had tossed her about like a tennis ball, though so far always kindly. Her own father had died when she was a baby, and while she was still quite tiny her mother had been married again to Mr. Hilton, a widower with a son of twenty. In his vacations from college Paul had made rather a pet of his little stepsister, and later on his kindness was put to a practical test. An epidemic of virulent influenza swept away in a single week both Mr. and Mrs. Hilton, and Lesbia, at eight years old, found herself an orphan. She had no very near relations, and the third and fourth cousins whom she possessed were not at all anxious to adopt her, so Paul, practical, unimaginative, common-sense Paul, took over the responsibility of her maintenance as a matter of course. Neither he, nor the pretty little bride whom he soon brought home, understood Lesbia in the least, her temperament held unknown qualities which their more direct minds could never grasp, but they were good to her, and accepted her without question as a member of the household, and as much a legacy as the family furniture.

The memory of her early days had grown rather hazy, and Lesbia was so accustomed to Paul and Minnie and the three small children who had arrived at Denham Terrace that no other life felt particularly possible. She was happy at school, and she rubbed along well at home. There was not surely a girl in her form who could claim more.

This first day of the new term had seemed fortunate to Lesbia. She had been raised to the honour of Va instead of being relegated with more backward girls to Vb, a contingency she had dreaded but half anticipated, and she had secured the very desk she had coveted for years. She came downstairs therefore at four o'clock with a feeling of much satisfaction. Even Aldora, whose wrath was short lived, had already forgiven the scrimmage and was friendly. Mentally Lesbia was purring.

"Wait for me for five minutes and I'll walk home with you," volunteered Aldora. "I have to take a letter from Mother to Miss Tatham, and she'll probably want to write an answer and send it by me."

And Lesbia, who loathed waiting for anybody, nevertheless agreed, as a kind of recompense to Aldora for having ousted her out of the best desk. It was a sunny afternoon so she went into the garden. There was a pleasant corner there with an artificial pond, and bushes, and flights of steps and a statue on a pedestal. She sat down under the shade of a red-berried shrub and watched in the water of the pool the reflections of white clouds that scudded overhead. The September wind blew, dropping rose petals into her lap. A robin near by twittered its autumn song. Summer was waning fast, and, though she did not yet know it, the summer of her careless childhood was falling away like the roses. The first disillusionment of mankind was in a garden; some of the greatest tragedies of the world have happened among a setting of trees and flowers.

As Lesbia sat twisting rose petals round her fingers she became aware of voices talking near her. Two girls had strolled to the pond by the lower path, and had settled down on the steps beneath her without noticing her presence. They were evidently discussing the various members of the form, and she caught her own name.

"Lesbia? Oh, I'm sorry for Lesbia!" (It was Marion Morwood who spoke.) "Why? Well you see she's in such a queer position. Her father died when she was a baby, and her mother married again, and then both her mother and her stepfather died. She lives with her stepbrother, who, of course, isn't the slightest relation to her really. He just keeps her out of charity. Mrs. James was telling mother all about it one day. She says Lesbia's own people didn't leave her a penny, and her relations won't help; so the Hiltons are saddled with her."

"Very decent of them."

"Um, yes, I suppose so; but of course she's tremendously useful with the children. You always see her trailing them out on Saturdays and Sundays, and often even on weekdays after school. She's as good as a nursemaid. I should hate to wheel a perambulator myself."

"Good-night! So should I! The bare idea gives me umpteen fits."

"I should call it the limit, but I suppose she simply has to do it. Mrs. James said Lesbia was fearfully slighted. (She lives next door to the Hiltons so she knows all about them.) They go out to the theatre and leave that poor girl to put all the children to bed, and——" But at this point Lesbia jumped up quietly and stole away. She did not want to overhear any more. Indeed she felt she had already heard far too much. A serpent had crept into her paradise. She was angry with that traitor Mrs. James for gossiping, but she began to wonder whether after all what Marion said was not perfectly true. It had never struck her before to view things from that angle. These were indeed new ideas! The remarks about her dependence on her stepbrother slid from her very lightly. As yet Lesbia was an utter baby in money matters. Paul and Minnie did not discuss their affairs in her presence, and her views were little more advanced than those of Steve and Julie, whose creed was that Daddy picked up pennies in the City and kept them in the big safe at his office. What really rankled was that Marion pitied her for taking out the children. She admired Marion immensely. There had been other friends in her school horizon, but her drifting devotion, which inclined for a time towards Phillis Marsh or Calla Wilkins, had lately centred on Marion. She wanted to stand well in her opinion. It had not occurred to her to compare herself with a nursemaid, for she loved the children and enjoyed taking them for walks, but now Marion had done so.

"I won't wheel that perambulator out again—ever!" she decided impulsively. "If I met Marion, and she looked sorry for me, I'd never get over it."

By this time Aldora was hunting for her and calling her name noisily, so she took up her strap of books and walked home, feeling as if her standards had suddenly and unexpectedly been turned upside down.

We have said before that Lesbia had a very sensitive disposition, so ultra-sensitive indeed that it sometimes eclipsed the more sensible portion of her. Instead of being glad that she was a much appreciated member of the Hilton household she began to wonder whether she was being put upon and slighted. All sorts of silly little incidents corroborating such a view came crowding into her memory. If we have a strong bias towards an opinion it is generally easy to prove our own argument by entirely ignoring the other side of the question. Minnie's many kindnesses were for the moment forgotten. Marion's approval seemed the only thing that mattered. It was horrible to think that her chum's friendliness was tinctured with pity. And friendly Marion undoubtedly was. She shared packets of chocolates with Lesbia, gave her snapshot photos which she had taken during the holidays, lent her books, and spent every available moment of recreation in her company. Marion was pretty and popular, so to be known as her chum was a matter for self congratulation. For at least a fortnight the two girls were as inseparable in school hours as a pair of lovers. The form, who had witnessed frantic friendships before, looked on with stolid indifference, tinged with occasional sense of injury. They preferred Marion to distribute her chocolates equally rather than to fill her chum's pockets. A really popular girl is seldom one who concentrates her affection on one object. Human nature is selfish enough to demand substantial reasons for placing a schoolfellow upon a pedestal, and Va, conscious of being left out in the cold, was beginning to wonder whether after all it had not been making too much fuss of Marion Morwood.

Lesbia, who went at least ten minutes out of her way every day in order to walk back from school with her idol, carefully avoided discussing home topics. She felt there was a sore spot that would hurt if it was touched. She fenced the questions which were sometimes—with evident curiosity—put to her.

One afternoon, as the chums had reached the Morwoods' gate, a heavy shower gave Marion the excuse to ask Lesbia to come in and shelter. They spent a rapturous quarter of an hour inspecting a collection of stamps, then Lesbia, who was late already, glanced through the window at the clearing sky.

"I must go," she groaned. "The rain's almost stopped now. Look at the time! And we have tea at half-past four. Botheration! I did want to see the rest of your stamps."

"Can't you possibly stop?"

"No, I must sprint. They won't know where I am."

"Then come back after tea! Mayn't she, Mother? Leo and Kitty will be here, and we'll try over some songs. Do come!" Mrs. Morwood very kindly endorsed her daughter's invitation, and pressed Lesbia to spend the evening. Lesbia, longing to come, accepted provisionally.

"I will if I can, but I shall have to ask at home," she confided at the hall door as she put up her umbrella.

Marion's face reddened with indignant sympathy.

"You don't mean to tell me they keep you as tight as that?" she flared.

But her friend was half-way down the steps by that time and did not reply.

Lesbia, bursting into the dining-room at home, where her belated tea was keeping warm under a cosy, found Minnie lying upon the sofa with a handkerchief soaked in eau-de-Cologne laid across her forehead. She jumped nervously at the noise, and listened with closed eyes as her young stepsister-in-law poured forth her request.

"Oh, Lesbia! I can't possibly let you go this evening! It's Nurse's night out, and I've got an overwhelming headache. Who's going to put the children to bed?"

"Can't Mrs. Carter do it?" asked Lesbia, choking back something that rose in her throat.

"I daren't ask her. When I engaged her she stipulated she was to have nothing to do in the nursery. It's so difficult to get a cook nowadays, that when you've found one you want to keep her."

"Can't Nurse stay in for once?"

"She'd give notice if I suggested it. You know she always goes to the Cinema on Friday nights."

"Suppose I ask her? Or Mrs. Carter?"

But at this point Paul, who had been sitting reading in the armchair, suddenly rose and interfered.

"Nonsense, Lesbia!" he said. "You mustn't go upsetting the household. And after all I'm not sure that I care about your visiting with these Morwoods. We don't know them."

He lighted a cigarette, and strolled into the greenhouse to smoke it, with an air of having settled the matter finally. Lesbia, drinking rather stewed tea and cold buttered toast, kept silence, but black rebellion raged in her heart. It was a Friday evening, and she had no home lessons to prepare. It would have been so delightful to have spent a few hours with the Morwoods. It was still only half-past five, and the children did not begin to go to bed until half-past six. Suppose she ran round to Marion's now, she could come back in time to give them their baths. Even half an hour of fun would be better than nothing. She peeped hurriedly into the nursery, where Julie, Steve, and Bunty were playing with their toys, as good as gold, then, changing at lightning speed into her best dress, she snatched up her waterproof, crammed on her hat, and fled from the house. Marion welcomed her ecstatically. Several friends, who had been rung up by telephone, had arrived, so there was quite an impromptu little party. (Lesbia was immensely glad she had put on her blue velveteen.) Carrie Turner and Cissie Hales represented school, and there were other girls and their brothers, who seemed on familiar terms with the Morwoods. They were already dancing in the drawing-room, while Blanche, Marion's cousin, played the piano for them. It did not take long for Lesbia to be introduced to the jolly company, and she was soon whirling round with a partner. Lesbia loved dancing. To some people it is as much a natural gift as singing or painting. To move to the rhythm of music was perhaps an old Celtic tendency cropping out in her composition. She felt sometimes like Karen in Hans Andersen's story of The Little Red Shoes: when she heard a lively tune her feet just danced of themselves. The Morwoods' drawing-room was large, and they had moved tables and chairs back against the wall, so there was plenty of space for enjoyment. Half an hour seemed to fly like ten minutes.

"Go! What ridiculous rubbish! Why, you've only just come!" remonstrated Marion, when her friend, with many apologies, began to say good-bye. "Lesbia! I simply shan't let you! Here's Bobby Craven longing to dance with you. You can't say no. I shall be absolutely offended if you tear away now. Yes, I mean it!"

Three children and a bath-towel tugged one way, and Bobby Craven's expectant face the other. Marion's threatened wrath tipped up the balance.

"The children will have to go to bed a little later to-night, that's all," thought Lesbia hastily, as the music began again and Bobby offered his arm.

At seven o'clock, however, her conscience smote her. She refused any more offers of partners and was in a panic to get away.

"Why, my dear," said Mrs. Morwood, passing through the hall where Lesbia was hastily changing her shoes. "You're surely not leaving us? We're going to have supper directly."

"She says she can't stay, Mums," explained Marion. "They want her at home. Oh, it's a shame! I never felt so angry in my life. I could just slay those wretched Hilton children—spoiling all Lesbia's fun. Good-bye, dearest! I call you an absolute martyr. I tell you I'm raging."

Lesbia ran all the way home, and let herself in by the side door. She hung her hat on the hat-stand and hurried upstairs. Sounds of splashing issued from the bath-room. She entered, and found Julie and Bunty holding a water carnival inside the bath, while Minnie, in flannel apron, with a flushed, tired face, was soaping Steve's curls.

"Where have you been?" she exclaimed, as the truant put in an appearance and began to get to business. "Lesbia! You can't lift Bunty from the bath in your best velvet dress! She's splashing you all over. Go and change it at once! Stephen, come here!" (as her son and heir took the opportunity to escape) "Julie, you mustn't duck Bunty! I don't want her hair wetted to-night. There's the first gong. Supper will have to wait. You ought, all of you, to have been in bed half an hour ago."

Paul, good natured easy-going Paul, was seldom cross to his young stepsister, but that night, with supper late, the soufflé spoilt through long waiting, and his wife in the throes of a violent headache, he lost his temper and gave Lesbia a thorough scolding.

"I told you to stay in and help Minnie," he stormed. "It's a queer thing to have three women in the house and nobody to lend a hand to put those youngsters to bed. You're not worth your salt! And I won't have you accepting invitations on your own and just walking off. Understand that once and for all. I'm thoroughly disgusted with you."

Lesbia lay awake in bed for hours that night crying. It was the first time Paul had ever spoken so sharply to her. Several things hurt particularly. He had alluded to "three women in the house".

Though she would soon be sixteen Lesbia did not care to be called "a woman", and particularly to be classed with Mrs. Carter and Nurse. Moreover he had said she was not worth her salt. Did he expect her to render service to the household? All Marion's insinuations came sweeping into her memory. Yes, undoubtedly she was slighted at home and expected to do things which other girls were not. Paul of course loved Minnie and his own children far better than herself. What had Calla hinted one day about taking a back seat? The girls at school knew her position and were sorry for her.

"It's horrible to be only 'a step'," sobbed Lesbia. "Perhaps Paul and Minnie would be happier without me. I don't really belong to them. Marion said so. Oh dear! I wonder if there's anybody in the wide world who'd like to have me? I don't believe I'm wanted here in this house!"

CHAPTER III
Lotus Blooms

Paul's bursts of temper were always short-lived and soon repented, and Minnie had a remarkably gentle disposition. After Friday night's storm they were both particularly sweet to Lesbia. They even suggested that she might ask a few of her school chums to tea and included Marion Morwood in the invitation.

"We want you to have plenty of young friends, dear!" said Minnie earnestly.

"Yes, of course. You must have friends of your own age," endorsed Paul.

So half a dozen of the elect of Va were bidden for tea and games, and spent a hilarious Saturday afternoon in the Hiltons' drawing-room. Minnie made a gracious hostess at the tea-table, but had the tact to leave the girls to themselves afterwards. The children, in their prettiest clothes, were duly paraded, but not allowed to stay too long among the visitors. There were chocolates in little bon-bon dishes, and there were two competitions for prizes.

"I have enjoyed myself," said Calla, in the bedroom where the party was putting on hats and coats to go home. "It's been ripping—absolutely top-hole."

"Scrumptious!" agreed Kathleen, hugging a first prize.

"You're a lucker, Lesbia!" proclaimed Phillis.

"Those kids are priceless, and I like Mrs. Hilton awfully," commented Aldora.

"Relations generally play up for parties. I wonder what they're like in private?" whispered Marion to Etta, as the two sat on the floor changing their shoes.

She whispered it very softly, and she really did not intend Lesbia to overhear, but her chum chanced to move forward at that very moment and caught the unpleasant words. It made the only disagreeable note in her party. Marion shook hands warmly with Mrs. Hilton and thanked her for her hospitality as she said good-bye, but Lesbia, standing near, thought her politeness lacked a genuine ring. She could not forget the chance whisper she had overheard in the bedroom.

At the High School matters were going briskly this new term. Miss Tatham's scheme for self-expression found favour with the girls. It was so delightful to be able to choose your own lessons, if only for two afternoons during the week. There were tremendous debates about the various subjects on the list.

"It's a grizzly nuisance we mayn't do a bit of everything," mourned Marjorie Johns. "I want to paint and sing and act and learn wood-carving as well. Why can't we fit it all in?"

"Because the powers that be say there isn't time, my child. With your voice there's absolutely nothing for it but song-drama. It's Kismet."

"But I want to make my Christmas presents. Carving would be so useful."

"You'll have to make them at home. You're booked for song-drama, I tell you. Miss Bates has her eye on you."

"Oh, indeed! What about free choice then?"

"I think I shall go in for song-drama, it sounds ripping," lisped Ermie Hall, a short fat girl, whose speech, in spite of the persistent efforts of the elocution mistress, still clung to the "lal" of her childhood.

"You! Are we to have a chorus of corn-crakes?" hinnied Cissie Hales, who never spared her comments.

"We can choose what we like I suppose?" flared Ermie.

"No we can't altogether. There's to be a selection for song-drama. Theodora told me so. Miss Bates is to weed out the bad voices and pick a decent caste."

"A good thing too—for those who'll have to listen at Christmas," commented Aldora. "The audience ought to have some consideration shown to it."

"It would be hateful to choose song-drama and then be turned down," ventured Bernadine Molyneaux.

"Unthinkable," agreed Lesbia. "I know my voice is nothing, and I've not much ear for music (though I love it), so it's no use my playing out of tune in the orchestra. I'm going in hot and strong for Art on Tuesday afternoons. I shall put my name down for it. Here goes!"

"Are you absolutely sure?" warned Cissie, mock-tragically, as Lesbia, pencil in hand, approached the list. "Remember it's like getting married, and you can't change your mind. It's a case of 'say it now or hereafter for ever hold your peace!' When once you're wedded to the Arts class you may find you're 'mated to a clown' as Tennyson puts it. 'Be wise in time, O Lesbia mine!' Don't sacrifice your beautiful youth upon the Altar of Arts. Music woos you round the corner!"

"And would soon throw me overboard," laughed Lesbia. "Be thankful you'll have me as audience at Christmas. You want somebody, I suppose, to come and clap the performance. There now! My name's the first on the 'Altar of Arts' as you call it. Who else is going to have a good time on Tuesday afternoons in the studio?"

Lizzie Logan, Connie Blakeley, Aldora Dodson, and Laura Berkshaw at once followed Lesbia's lead, and Ermie Hall after a lingering look at the music list also signed her name under the heading of Art.

There still remained the choice of the intellectual hobby for Friday afternoons. Here Miss Tatham had allowed two subjects to be linked together, and from among them Lesbia selected 'Nature Study' and 'Antiquities'. She liked old houses and old customs, and the prospect of collecting the City's legends interested her.

Tuesday and Friday afternoons were now held to be the landmarks of the week. The school orchestra, which before had languished and almost winked out, took on a fresh lease of life. Violin cases and even violoncello cases appeared in the cloak-room, and from the sanctuary of Vb, turned into a temporary practice room, came weird sounds, somewhat rasping and scraping at first, but improving in quality as the term wore on. Those outside the locked door, though really rather thrilled, affected to mock at the music, and would ask facetiously if the wolves were howling, or where all the cats came from. The instrumentalists however, proud of their revived Society, took no notice of scoffing remarks and would reply loftily:

"Ah! Just you wait till Christmas and then you'll see."

"And in the meantime we hear, worse luck!" retorted their impudent critics. "Pity there isn't a sound-proof room for practising in this school."

Lesbia was immensely happy in the studio, where there were facilities for carrying out all sorts of fads. She had always longed to try stencilling and velvet painting, but could never before get on the right track of the processes. The new art teacher, Miss Joyce, was ready to give any explanations, and though the girls worked away "on their own" they could come to her as often as they liked with their difficulties. Lesbia complacently stencilled everything upon which it was possible to lay a pattern, work-bags, boxes, book-covers, and even a pinafore for Julie, though she knew to her sorrow that the first wash would remove the fruits of her labours, and Julie's pinafores never lasted clean more than a few hours. She longed for more scope, and had visions of covering the nursery walls at Denham Terrace with designs of Noah's Ark animals, insects, and butterflies.

"The children would love it," she explained to Minnie, "and if you'd only have a dado colourwashed over the wallpaper, I could stencil a row of creatures along the top, just on a level with the children's eyes. It would look as nice as one of those model nurseries we saw at the exhibition. Do let me, won't you?"

To her surprise Minnie hesitated, seemed to think the offer over, and refused it.

"The room was decorated only last spring, and I don't want to have the men in the house again," she declared.

"It doesn't need a man just to colourwash a dado," persisted Lesbia. "Why I believe Nurse could manage it."

"Nurse has plenty to do without colourwashing the nursery. Besides it's not worth while now, when——"

Minnie stopped abruptly, looking rather conscious.

"Not worth while? Not when the children would adore it?"

"I didn't mean that. I daresay they'd like it well enough."

"Then what did you mean?"

"Something I can't tell you. Don't bother, Lesbia, you can't know everything in this house. It's no use your putting a dado here. Perhaps some day, who knows?—your stencils may come in useful on some other walls."

Minnie spoke with a shade of embarrassment. Her young stepsister-in-law was gazing at her critically.

"How you love mysteries," remarked Lesbia. "All I can say is that, if you're thinking of removing, you'll find it a business to get another house unless you buy it, and Paul said this morning that nothing would induce him to buy property at the top tide of the market. The Morwoods have been trying to remove for two years, and can't hear of a house anywhere."

"The Morwoods' affairs have nothing to do with ours," remarked Minnie, closing the conversation firmly.

It was a blow to Lesbia not to be allowed to try her skill at decorating the nursery. She thought it highly unreasonable of Minnie. She stencilled some of the animals on pieces of paper and fastened them with drawing-pins on to the walls in a corner of the room, to show how nice the effect would be, but the children's inquisitive little fingers pulled at the edges of the paper and soon tore them down. In her annoyance she confided the whole of the affair to Marion, who was breezily sympathetic.

"How stupid and unenlightened!" raged her chum. "They ought to have been only too pleased to have the nursery so improved. Your stencil work's lovely. There isn't a girl in the school who can do it half so well. I'll tell you what. I've got an idea! An absolute brain wave. The walls of Va are colourwashed. Why don't you go to Miss Tatham and ask her to let you stencil them? It would be a boon to the form."

"O-o-o-h! I daren't!"

"Why not? She's rubbed in self-expression and here you are wanting to express yourself."

"So I am—in stencil work."

"I'll go with you to the study if you like."

"I wish you would. I'd never have the courage to march in alone. Suppose she thinks it cool cheek and absolutely withers me?"

"Then you'll be a faded flower, a broken butterfly, a crushed worm," laughed Marion. "Come along. Nothing venture nothing win. I'll guarantee Tatie won't eat you."

Miss Tatham, sitting in the sanctum of her study with a pile of exercise books on the desk before her, gasped a little when Lesbia advanced her idea. This was self-expression with a vengeance. Rather a startling proposal certainly, yet it seemed to show such initiative that it was a hopeful sign of progress under the new régime.

"I'll consider it, Lesbia," she said thoughtfully. "I must see some of your stencil work first, and have a talk with Miss Joyce. I'm always glad when girls wish to do anything for the school, but, of course, the quality of the work must be very high before it's worthy of a place in a form room."

"Lesbia's the oldest pupil at the school," ventured Marion rather inconsequently.

"That unfortunately doesn't guarantee proficiency in Art," twinkled Miss Tatham; "if everything went by seniority there would be no prizes."

Feeling half-crushed and half-encouraged Lesbia beat a retreat, expecting to hear nothing more about the matter, and doubting whether she had done herself any good at head-quarters. Miss Tatham, however, examined her work privately, and after a long talk with Miss Joyce summoned Lesbia to the study and announced that she would be allowed to stencil a border in Va under the close superintendence of the Art Mistress. This was indeed a triumph for Lesbia. Her disappointment about the dado for the nursery faded into nothingness now that she might actually decorate her own form room. Fortunately for her peace of mind she had no rivals in her own particular field. The only other girls in Va who took stencilling were Lizzie Logan and Laura Birkshaw, and both were such hopeless amateurs at it that they realized their own lack of skill, and would never have ventured to touch the schoolroom walls. Grace Stirling of the Sixth, however, and Alice Orton in Vb, were so fired with enthusiasm that they later asked and received permission to perform the same artistic service for their own forms. Lesbia was the pioneer, however, and won considerable credit for the idea, though she had the honesty to tell everybody that the original suggestion was Marion's.

Of course, the first and most thrilling step was to choose a good design. Both Lesbia and Miss Joyce decided that it ought to be original, and that they would evolve it between them.

"I have all sorts of sketches at my studio that would be helpful," said Miss Joyce. "Suppose you come back with me one day after school, and we'll look them over."

"Oh, may I?" said Lesbia, delighted. "Thanks immensely."

So on the following Thursday at four o'clock, instead of walking home to Denham Terrace, she turned into the town instead. Miss Joyce had a studio in Pilgrims' Inn Chambers, a collection of rooms let as offices and flats in a big old house near the river. In pre-Reformation times it had been a hostelry for the use of pilgrims, who came to visit the miraculous shrine at the little chapel on the bridge, and since then it had passed through many vicissitudes and had fallen on evil days, till a public-spirited citizen had taken compassion on its dilapidated condition and had bought it, caused it to be carefully restored, and had let it to various tenants. It was a beautiful example of mediæval architecture, and its quaint gables and timbered walls were built round a courtyard of cobbled stones. Lesbia, passing under a carved doorway and up a black oak staircase, felt as if she stepped into an atmosphere of five or six hundred years ago. Miss Joyce's studio was a large, quaint room with a raftered roof of ancient beams, and had latticed windows at either end, looking out upon the courtyard and upon the river. She held classes here for several kinds of art work, and tables were covered with specimens of her own or her pupils' paintings and handicrafts. Lesbia stared, fascinated by the display, and Miss Joyce left her to look round while she lighted a gas ring, put on a kettle and took some cups and saucers from a cupboard.

"We must have studio tea before we do anything," she decreed. "I always need tea horribly at this hour of the day, and I'm very cross if I can't get it. Take that comfy chair, Lesbia. We'll go through the designs afterwards."

"What a heavenly room!" said Lesbia, leaning back in a picturesque wicker armchair and holding a pale-yellow teacup in her hand, and a plate with a slice of walnut-cake on her knee. "It's too delightful and quaint for words. Are you here most of the day? Lucky you!"

"I have my classes at the High School, of course, but I give most of my lessons here, and do my own work too. Sometimes when I'm very busy and want to stay late I even sleep here. I have a little bedroom through that doorway."

"Sleep here! All alone! Aren't you frightened?"

"Not a bit."

"I should be scared to death. The whole place feels haunted. At midnight I'm sure it would be full of ghosts."

"I've never seen or heard any of them yet," smiled Miss Joyce. "If they're here they don't disturb me at any rate. I'm a sound sleeper and I never think about them. Now, I'm afraid we must hurry and look over our designs, for I have a class coming at half-past five."

"And I'm wasting your precious time," said Lesbia, springing up.

"Not at all. I should have had tea in any case. I told you I can't get on without it."

Miss Joyce had studied design, and had a big portfolio of drawings put away in a corner. She lifted it on to a table, and she and Lesbia went through its contents carefully. They were lost in choice between poppyheads, almond blossom, vine leaves, ivy, brier rose and irises, but finally decided to adapt a painting of water-lilies for their purpose.

"Lotus blooms were a great feature of decorative art in ancient Egypt," said Miss Joyce, hunting through a book on "Egyptian ornament" to demonstrate her point. "Look at this delicious little bit! With the long stems and the leaves and the seed vessels we ought to be able to manage something satisfactory. I'll bring the painting and the book to school, then we must evolve a simple design that we can cut in stencil. Done in dull green on the pale green colourwash I flatter ourselves it ought to look rather artistic."

"It'll be simply topping. How I shall enjoy dabbing it on! Thanks a million times for helping. Is this a pupil coming?" (as a suggestive tap sounded on the door). "Then I must take my books and scoot off. Good-bye—and again thank you awfully!"

CHAPTER IV
An Upheaval

With a certain amount of help from Miss Joyce Lesbia contrived to make a really very nice stencil design of water-lilies. It was submitted to Miss Tatham, who gave her approval and permission for it to be transferred to the walls of Va. It was a proud occasion for Lesbia when Tuesday afternoon saw her installed in her own form room with stencil, paints, and brushes, actually beginning the delightful task of decoration. The room was vacant only on that one afternoon in the week, and Miss Tatham would not allow her to stay and work after school hours, so her plan must proceed piecemeal with about a couple of yards painted at a stretch. It gave an added interest to spread out the enjoyment from week to week, though the wall looked horribly unfinished with a half-completed design. She had been a little doubtful as to how the form would receive her handiwork, and whether they would consider it an improvement or an eyesore. Fortunately, they liked it, and told her to hurry up and get along with it as fast as she could. The girls whose desks adjoined the finished portion even crowed over those who sat near bare walls. Miss Pratt—practical, hard-headed, inartistic Miss Pratt—after carefully ascertaining that the work did not trespass upon Lesbia's preparation hours, condescended to approve, though she added grimly that she would like to see an equal amount of care and attention put into the Latin exercises and the Algebra classes. Every rose has its thorn, and Miss Pratt's praises were never without a sting.

Meantime the exponents of song-drama had waxed wildly enthusiastic over the preparation of The King of Tara, which they intended to produce before the school at Christmas. They had already held one or two practices with the orchestra, and were much thrilled to hear how well their choruses sounded in conjunction with the instruments.

"We've just been learning the music so far, but we're to begin the acting next week," purred Marion to Lesbia, "and when we get the dresses it will be absolutely tip-top. I wish you were in it."

"So do I," said Lesbia half wistfully, "but Miss Tatham won't let us swop; besides I've got to finish the lotus pattern. It'll take me till very nearly the end of the term. I have to do it so carefully. If I try to hurry I don't get the edges neat. It's my nightmare that some day I'll let the stencil slip and make a smudge on the wall."

"Aren't you getting tired of everlasting waterlilies?"

"No—not the teeniest, weeniest bit!"

Though the girls were perhaps keenest upon what Miss Tatham termed the "emotional" side of her new department of self-expression, they nevertheless found something to attract them on the "mental" side. The Antiquities Section, for which Lesbia had put down her name, held out fascinating attractions. As a part of its activities the girls were to form a "Scheduling party" to visit any interesting old buildings in the city, to write full particulars of them in notebooks, and if possible to add photographs and drawings. Under the escort of Miss Chatham, companies of a dozen at a time made expeditions of inspection, and were as a rule kindly received by curators and caretakers, and were shown over extra rooms and premises that were not generally open to the public. The girls scribbled their notes on the spot, then wrote them out carefully afterwards in exercise books. There was rivalry as to who should produce the best book. Lesbia made an artistic cover for hers, out of dull-green paper, with a pen-and-ink drawing of the picturesque Bolingbroke Arms Inn, and the title "Antiquities of Kingfield" printed in old English characters. She wrote the text neatly, pasted in photos which she had taken, and cut out any pictures she could find in the local papers to supplement them as illustrations. It was whispered in the school that when the books were finished they were to be shown to the Kingfield Archæological Society, who had hinted at giving prizes for the best efforts.

It was amazing when the girls really began to study their city how much information came to light. The very names of the streets revealed ancient history. Long, long ago the ownership of the town had been divided between the Earl of Dudley and the monks of the Abbey, and lord and abbot waged continual war over the boundaries of their respective properties. It was significant to notice in one quarter of the city such names as Earl Street, Castle Gate, Dudley Gate, Tower Lane, Castle Moat, Earl's Barn, The Butts, Falcon Mews, and Bull Ring, telling their tale of mediæval castle, where archery, hawking, and bull-baiting were favourite pursuits, and in the other quarter ecclesiastical names, Abbot's Orchard, Pilgrims' Inn, Greyfriars' Yard, Monks End, Whitefriars Street, and Priory Gardens, all showing that they had formerly been part of the church lands. The girls each bought a street map of Kingfield, and marked with coloured chalks the old boundaries of earl and abbot, and the course of the city wall, large pieces of which were still left standing in spite of Oliver Cromwell's cannon. Carrie Turner covered herself with immortal glory for the ancient wall actually ran through her father's garden, and she invited the members of her scheduling section and Miss Chatham not only to come and inspect it, but actually to have tea upon the top of it. It was nine feet wide, so there was quite room to accommodate a table and some chairs and stools. The girls, in a flutter of delight, mounted by a ladder, and sat aloft drinking tea and eating cakes, with a fine view over neighbouring gables and gardens, and a romantic feeling that they ought to be garbed in coif and wimple, and watching the prowess of their knights who fought in tournament in the lists below.

The antiquarian section really caught "mediæval fever", and visited the Free Reference Library to consult books which would tell them the ancient history of Kingfield. They copied out the most interesting stories into their notebooks, and anybody who could borrow an out-of-print guide-book, and collect any fresh legends to add to the list, scored considerably.

Another valuable and well-nigh inexhaustible source of information was discovered by the girls in their friends at home. Grandfathers and grandmothers recalled tales of their childhood, and would relate how, as youngsters of ten, they had hurried past Greyfriars Gate in the twilight, because the ghost of a wicked abbot was supposed to haunt the vicinity, and you might see his grey robes gliding among the shadows when the sun set. Some of them remembered when Miller's Pond, now quite a suburban piece of water, was known as Dragon's Pool, and had been a romantic spot half-smothered in willows, with a legend of a dragon who lived there and would come to the castle walls to demand victims.

"Legend hunting is almost like treasure seeking," declared Lesbia. "You never know what you may find."

Lesbia was very happy at school this term, in spite of skirmishes with Miss Pratt over Latin and Algebra, her two worst subjects. She felt she was taking an active part in the school life, and contributing her quota in a very substantial measure to the benefit of Va, whose walls looked already much improved. The hockey season had begun also, and though she had not yet won special distinction in the playing-field, she had occasionally wrung a word or two of encouragement from Rose Stirling, the Games Captain, sufficient to elate her for the moment, and make her keener at next practice. She loved those Wednesday afternoons when she donned her short blue skirt and scarlet blouse and pads, and went with her team to the big field rented by the school. The autumn nip in the air made exercise pleasant, and the love of sport, inherent in everyone of even diluted British blood, brought all her Anglo-Saxon tendencies to the fore.

As the mediæval dwellers in Kingfield must have fought in the lists, and shot arrows at the butts, and wrestled, or cudgelled with quarter-staffs in the meadows, so their descendants enjoyed themselves in the playing-fields, demonstrating the modern theory that girls need physical training as much as boys, and can play a game with equal keenness and observance of rules.

October, with its whirling leaves and bursts of fitful sunshine, had worn itself away and given place to November mists. Hallow-e'en had come and gone, and the half-term holiday was over. Already everybody was beginning to think about Christmas and to make plans for the term-end festivities. Lesbia, sitting at the supper table in Denham Terrace, gave Paul and Minnie a highly-coloured account of the entertainment to which they would be invited.

"You'll love it. It's to be the best thing we've ever given at Kingfield High," she concluded.

For a moment there was an embarrassing silence. Minnie was looking at Paul beseechingly. He cleared his throat.

"Perhaps we'd really better tell her now," he remarked.

"Tell me what?" asked Lesbia.

"Well, the fact of the matter is we shall none of us be here for Christmas. By the time your song-drama—or whatever you call it—comes off, we shall all be many thousands of miles away. We're going out to Canada."

"To Canada!" gasped Lesbia, utterly overwhelmed. "All of us?"

"Yes, the whole family. I've accepted an appointment there, and we start in a fortnight."

"Isn't it—isn't it very sudden?" faltered Lesbia.

"Paul knew some months ago, dear," said Minnie, "and our passages have been booked quite a long time."

"And you never told me!" Lesbia's voice was most reproachful.

"We were afraid it would unsettle you at school if you knew you were leaving. I spoke to Miss Tatham about telling you, and she quite agreed with us."

"But do you mean I'm to leave Kingfield and the High School and everything in a fortnight?" asked Lesbia, her eyes suddenly swimming with tears.

"Come, cheer up!" said Paul. "You'll like Canada well enough when you get there. Girls have rather a good time I believe."

Later on, when Lesbia was alone with Minnie, she heard fuller particulars.

"Paul is very glad to get the appointment. It's so difficult to make any headway in England nowadays. There seems more scope in a new country. It'll be a good thing for the children too, when they begin to grow up. England's overcrowded. They'll have better prospects in Canada."

"What's the place like? Are there great forests and lakes and rivers and Red Indians?" asked Lesbia, calling to mind any stories she had read of the Dominion.

"No, Belleville's not at all romantic. It's quite a new city, and it's on the plains, not near any forests or rivers, I believe."

"O-o-h!" (disappointedly). "Are Nurse and Mrs. Carter going with us?"

"Nurse doesn't want to leave England. She's to be married next year. And Mrs. Carter is too old to emigrate, and has two sons settled in Kingfield. You and I can look after the children on the voyage, can't we?"

"I suppose so!" gulped Lesbia.

She was appalled at the whole idea. Emigration to Canada sounded about as cheerful as banishment to Siberia. To leave Kingfield, with its quaint buildings and old associations, and the High School where she was so happy, and to be whisked away over the sea to a bare new city and a winter of snow and ice—oh, it was horrible! And only a fortnight in which to get ready. They ought to have told her before. It was too bad to keep her—a girl of nearly sixteen—in the dark, as if she were one of the children. Minnie and Paul had had plenty of time to make their preparations, but for herself everything would be a scurry. She would not even be able to finish the decoration of Va. She carried the bad news to school next morning. Marion received it with a perfect outburst of indignation.

"What an atrocious shame! To think of springing it upon you in this sudden fashion. Oh, it's too bad to take you away from the High School! Where are you going to finish your education? Is there a school at this place you're going to?"

"I don't know."

"You probably won't have time for school when you get there. Servants are scarce in Canada and you'll have to turn to and help!"

"We're not taking nurse or anyone with us," volunteered Lesbia.

"Then you'll be nursemaid on the voyage?"

"I suppose so."

"I like that!" flamed Marion. "Why can't they leave you behind in Kingfield, to finish at the High?"

"Oh, I wish they would!"

"I wish they'd leave you with us," said Marion impulsively. "Mother'd adore to have you—she likes you awfully—and as for me I'd dance a jubilee. I've always wanted a sister, and we get on so well together, don't we? Oh, it would be sport!"

"It would indeed!" agreed Lesbia wistfully.

She ventured to mention the great idea to Minnie, who laughed, and then looked suddenly hurt.

"Nonsense, Lesbia child," she said. "We're not going away and leaving you behind. I'm sure the Morwoods don't want you as a legacy."

"Marion said they did!"

"Girls like Marion talk a great deal of rubbish, so don't listen to her. I've put a packing-case in your bedroom, and you may fill it with books and any other things you like to take. It will go in the hold of the vessel. Your clothes must be packed in the tin box and the cabin trunk. We'll buy our fur coats when we get over. They'll be cheaper in Canada than in England."

The Hilton household was naturally deep in preparations for the forthcoming upheaval. Clothes, books, and a few special treasures were to go with them, but they were leaving the furniture to be sold, and would re-furnish when they found a house in Belleville. The children, who now shared the open secret, ran about in much excitement, anxious to start at once on what seemed to them a second summer holiday.

"We shall have an awful time looking after these three scaramouches on board ship," groaned Lesbia, picking Steve out of the packing-case where he had climbed, and rescuing various fragile articles from Julie's and Bunty's prying little fingers.

The more she thought of the prospect the more her heart sank. She did not wish to leave Kingfield at all, but if emigration were a necessity, she would have preferred some beautiful place such as California, or the hot springs district of New Zealand, or certain parts of Australia where the climate was adorable and oranges and peaches hung in your garden.

There were of course many leave-takings before their departure. Lesbia had to go one afternoon to say good-bye to the Pattersons. They were distant cousins, and her only relations in Kingfield. They lived at the opposite side of the city, and she did not see them very often. They had not been consulted about Lesbia's future, and were ready to find fault with her stepbrother's arrangement for her.

"Well, Lesbia! This will be a great change for you," began Mrs. Patterson. "If I'd been asked I should have said 'leave you to finish off at the High School'. It seems a pity to stop your education just when you're getting on nicely."

"I wish they would leave me behind," said Lesbia. "I don't want to go at all."

"We might easily have taken you in," continued Mrs. Patterson. "All three of the boys are away at present. It would have been far better for you. But our advice has never been asked. Paul Hilton goes his own way. Yet really you're more our relation than his. I hope you'll be happy out in Canada. You must write to us sometimes and tell us how you're getting on. Your cousin, Mrs. Baynes, will be very surprised to hear the news. Have you written to tell her? Or to your aunt Mrs. Newton? They really ought to know. It hardly seems right you should go away in this sudden fashion and leave all your kith and kin behind you. You must write to-morrow, Lesbia, and tell them."

Lesbia assented apathetically. She was not very deeply interested in Mrs. Baynes or Mrs. Newton. She had only met the former twice in her life, and Mrs. Newton, her mother's aunt, was not a remarkably attractive old lady. On the few occasions when she saw Lesbia she invariably said she was just going to send her a present and would buy her a book, but she never remembered to keep her promise and the parcel had not yet arrived. Lesbia, who had waited for it since her sixth year, was of the opinion that it never would come.

With school friends and relations bemoaning her departure it was rather hard to take a hopeful view of the future. The only person who encouraged her was Miss Pratt.

"Going to Canada," she commented. "You lucky girl! I wish I could go myself. It's a splendidly go-ahead country. There's some chance for people out there."

"That's what Paul and Minnie say," thought Lesbia, "but of course they have each other and the children. I'm sure Miss Pratt would be welcome to go in my place. I'd much rather stay in dear old England if I was asked."

CHAPTER V
Lesbia Burns her Boats

There was so much to be done before the Hiltons set sail for Canada that the brief fortnight seemed to slide away like a few days. Lesbia attended school, but her lessons went to the winds, amply justifying Miss Tatham's decision that the news of her impending departure would unsettle her work. Unsettle her? How was it possible to do any work at all when she could count the days and say "This time next week I shall be upon the ocean"? She dreaded the voyage. On the few occasions, during summer holidays, that she had been for a sea trip, she had proved a poor sailor. Though Paul assured her the motion would be far less on a big steamer than on a small yacht, she would not take his word for it.

"I shall wish myself at the bottom before we've passed Queenstown," she declared tragically.

At school some little mystery was apparently going on. The girls would be talking, then would stop suddenly when she approached. She wondered about it vaguely. It was explained on her last day, when, at four o'clock, she was asked by Theodora Johnson to come into the gymnasium. Her own form and quite a number from the Sixth and from Vb and IVa were assembled there. To her surprise she seemed to be the centre of attraction. Everybody looked first at her, and then at Theodora, who began to make a speech.

"We're all very sorry you're leaving the school, Lesbia. You've been here longer than anybody else, and it seems a pity you can't go through the Sixth. We shall miss you very much, and we hope you'll accept this good-bye present from us."

She handed Lesbia a beautiful leather dispatch case, with the initials L. F. stamped upon it in gold.

Lesbia received it with amazement. She had never expected any present, and the magnificence of this almost took her breath away.

"It's too good of you! I really don't know how to thank you all," she stammered.

"We thought it might be useful on the journey," explained Theodora. "It's nice when you're travelling to have a few things always handy."

"I shall value it immensely, for its own sake, and because you all gave it to me," said Lesbia.

Then began the good-byes. The girls crowded round her, and wished her well, and asked her to write, and not to forget her old school.

"I don't know who's to finish the stencilling in Va," said Kathleen Wilcox.

"I wish you could have heard the song-drama before you went," mourned Aldora Dodson.

"It's the biggest shame in the world that you're going, I shall always say they oughtn't to have taken you," declared Marion, throwing her arm around Lesbia's shoulder as they left the gymnasium.

The last evening in the old home was a forlorn experience even to Paul and Minnie, who had bright hopes for the future. Lesbia lay awake for hours crying, and woke with a nervous headache. She had packed a few clothes, brush and comb, and some other necessaries, in her new dispatch case, for they were to spend the night at a hotel in Liverpool, and go on board the Roumania on the following morning. Nurse had stayed till the last, to help with the preparations. She wept as she put her little charges into the taxi.

"God bless you! I almost wish I was going with you," she murmured, mopping her eyes.

The whole family looked solemn as they drove through the city, but the bustle of the railway station restored their spirits. Lesbia had to cling on to Bunty with one hand, and to hold her dispatch case with the other. When they were settled in a compartment and the train had started, she felt that her last link with Kingfield was severed. What would happen in her unknown future she could not tell.

It was a long journey to Liverpool, and the children were sleepy and cross before they at last reached the busy station and drove through the lighted streets to their hotel. The manageress had made a mistake in booking their order, and had only two small rooms left for them, so Lesbia was obliged to take both Julie and Bunty into her bed. It was a tight fit, and they were restless little people. Poor Lesbia, who had hardly closed her eyes the night before, found it impossible to sleep. If she managed to doze off Bunty would kick or Julie would fling out her arms. The dark hours passed like a nightmare. She welcomed the chambermaid's entrance with the hot water. Feeling utterly unrested, and nervy and disconsolate, she got up and dressed the children, who were in high spirits. Their noise made her head throb. Was every day of the journey going to be like this? There was a slight fog and drizzling rain outside. Not at all the sort of weather to inspire courage and hopefulness.

Lesbia made some pretence of eating breakfast in the Coffee Room, but she felt as if food would choke her. Minnie, with an anxious eye on the clock, though there was plenty of time to spare, pushed away her own breakfast almost untasted.

Emigration has its sad side. Even with husband and children it is a wrench to leave old England.

Then the hall porter announced their taxi, and once more they drove through Liverpool streets and along miles of docks to the particular dock where lay the Roumania. They were on board at last, with bag and baggage and the children all intact. Their big boxes were being lowered into the hold, and their cabin trunks were being marked with chalk by an official. A steward took them to their cabins, Nos. 51 and 59. Lesbia's experience in voyaging was confined to a 10-ton yacht. She had never been on a sea-going vessel before. She gazed round in dismay. Why, this tiny room with its four berths was actually smaller than the bathroom at home! There was scarcely space to turn round in it. It would be cramped enough if she had it all to herself, but she was to share it with the three children. How she would ever undress and dress them, wash them and comb their hair, much less manage her own toilet in such tiny quarters, she could not imagine. The porthole was closed, and the air felt stuffy. There is always an indescribably close oily smell about the atmosphere of any cabins, except deck staterooms, and those are generally booked by millionaires. Stewards were carrying in various bags and packages and tossing them down on the berths. Already the little place was so full she did not see where she, Julie, Steve, and Bunty were going to put themselves. An immense wave of repulsion swept over her. She could not—no she could not be boxed up with those children all the way across the Atlantic! It was too bad of Paul and Minnie to have brought her. They ought to have left her behind in England. The prospect before her was intolerable. She would give the whole world to get out of it, and return to Kingfield. To return to Kingfield! The idea struck her with a sudden swift temptation. The Morwoods and the Pattersons had both said they would have been glad to have her. Suppose she were to make her escape and go back? There was still time. Friends of the passengers were on the vessel. She could slip away amongst them unobserved. She had two pound notes in her purse (Paul had seen to it that she was not penniless), and that would be sufficient to pay her railway fare from Liverpool to Kingfield. Lesbia was nothing if not impulsive. It seemed a case of "now or never". All the Celtic side in her rushed to the fore. She never stopped to reason, but acted on the emotion of the moment.

"I'll do it!" she whispered to herself.

Taking her writing-block and a pencil from her dispatch case, she hastily scribbled a note.

"Dear Paul and Minnie,

"I feel I can't possibly go to Canada after all, so I am going back to Kingfield to the Morwoods and my own relations who never wanted me to go away. I hope you will have a nice voyage and be happy at Belleville.

"With much love,

"Lesbia."

She put this into an envelope, addressed it to Paul, and stuffed it inside Bunty's little pocket, where she thought it would be sure to be found later on. Then she kissed the children, took up her dispatch case, and fled on deck. The bell was ringing for friends to clear away from the ship. She stepped ashore with the first consignment. A tram-car was passing along the docks and she boarded it. By good luck it took her straight to the station. She booked for Kingfield and inquired the time of the next train.

"Number 5 platform. You'll just catch it if you're quick!" replied the porter.

Lesbia had only a hazy remembrance afterwards of how she tore up the steps and over the iron bridge to platform 5, but she somehow found herself jumping into a third-class carriage just as the porter was banging the doors and the guard was waving his green flag. She sank on to a seat exhausted, and trembling in every limb. The train started, and Liverpool and Canada lay behind her. Had she wished it was too late now to repent. She had indeed "burnt her boats".

To say that the Morwoods were surprised when Lesbia walked into their house that evening hardly describes their petrified astonishment. They stared at her as if they had seen a ghost. Lesbia, who had felt secure of a warm welcome, explained the situation.

"You've run away! Run away from your brother and sister and come to us!" gasped Mrs. Morwood. "But, my dear girl, we can't keep you! You must be mad to do such a thing. Have they actually sailed for Canada without you?"

"I didn't want to go!" answered Lesbia, choking with a lump that suddenly rose in her throat.

She had thought they would be so glad to see her, instead of which they were looking absolutely aghast at her appearance. It was the first great disillusionment of her life. In her bitter disappointment she sank on to a chair and burst into a storm of hysterical sobs. She was overstrung and tired out, and the coolness of her reception seemed like a plunge into an icy bath.

At the sight of such a tragic little lump of misery all Mrs. Morwood's natural kindness of heart reasserted itself. She and Marion comforted Lesbia as best they could.

"Drink this hot tea, child, and you'll feel better. It's no use crying your eyes out. You have some other relations in Kingfield? I thought so. Well, we'll keep you here for to-night, but to-morrow morning I shall send you to Mrs. Patterson. She's the proper person to take charge of you. I suppose she'll telegraph to your brother, and ask what's to be done. It's a most unfortunate business altogether. Cheer up! I suppose your relations will settle things somehow for you."

Lesbia went to bed early in the Morwoods' pretty spare bedroom, hastily got ready for her reception. She had hardly slept during the two previous nights so she was utterly weary, too tired almost to think. Her uppermost feeling as her head nestled on the frilled linen pillow-case was one of intense thankfulness that she was not in cabin 59 on the Roumania. Her bed was steady and the room airy. The wind was blowing a gale outside, and she pictured the steamer tossing on the waves, with portholes carefully closed. She wondered how the children were getting on—the children whom she had so suddenly deserted.

"I suppose Minnie'll go and sleep with them," she thought, stifling a voice within her that was beginning to ask certain uncomfortable questions. "I expect Bunty would give my letter to Paul as soon as they missed me. If not they'd find it in her pocket at bedtime. I wonder what they said? No, I don't! I just want to forget all about it and go to sleep."

Next morning, immediately after breakfast, Mrs. Morwood dispatched her unexpected guest to Mrs Patterson, who, she considered, ought to take charge of her. The Pattersons lived at Morton Common, a suburb on the opposite side of the city, and Lesbia went there in the tram-car. She had plenty of time for reflection upon the journey. After her experience with the Morwoods she was rather doubtful about her reception. Mrs. Morwood had plainly shown her strong disapproval, and Marion, though she was quite kind, had been frankly embarrassed. Lesbia was beginning to learn there was such a thing as "counting without one's host". She walked very solemnly into the gate of 28 Park Road, and gave a timid ring at the door bell.