The Girls of Central High Aiding the Red Cross | Page 7

Red Cross before--and one must do something, you know."
"Do something!" burst forth Bobby. "If you went to Central High and had Gee Gee for one of your teachers, you'd have plenty to do."
"We are all three Central High girls," said Laura gently. "Have you finished school, Miss Steele?"
"I have not been able to attend school regularly for two years," admitted the new girl. "I am afraid," and she smiled apologetically, "that you are all much further advanced in your education than I am. You see, my mother is an invalid and I must give her a great deal of my time. It does not interfere, however, with my doing a little for the Red Cross."
"I am sorry your mother is ill," said Laura.
"We were advised to come up here for her sake," said Janet Steele hastily. "We have been living in a coast town. The doctors thought an inland climate--a drier climate--would be beneficial."
"I hope it will prove so," said Laura.
"It seems a shame you can't get out with the other girls," Jess added.
"And come to school and let Gee Gee get after you," joined in Bobby grimly.
"Is she such a very strict disciplinarian?" asked Miss Steele, smiling down at the irrepressible one as they walked through the side street toward Whiffle.
"She's the limit," declared Bobby.
"Oh," said Laura mildly, "I think Miss Carrington is nowhere near so strict as she used to be. Margit Salgo really has made her quite human, you know."
"Say!" grumbled Bobby, "she can hand out demerits just as easy as ever. And she had her sense of humor extracted years ago."
"Has that fault cropped up lately, my dear?" asked Laura, laughing. "It must be so. What happened, Bobby?"
The younger girl, who was a sophomore, whereas Laura and Jess were juniors, came directly under Miss Carrington's attention in several classes. Bobby was forever getting into trouble with the strict teacher.
"Why, look, now," said Bobby, warmly, "just what happened yesterday! English class. You know, that's nuts for Gee Gee. I was bothered enough, I can tell you, trying to correct a paper she had handed back to me, and she kept right on talking and asking questions, and the recitation period was almost ended. I didn't want to hang around there to correct that paper--"
"You know very well you should have taken it home to correct," Laura put in.
"Oh, don't tell me that! I take so much extra work home as it is, that Father Tom Hargrew asks me if I don't do anything at all in school. And, anyway, I didn't think Gee Gee saw me. But, of course, she did."
"And then what?" Jess asked.
"Why, she shot a question at me, and I didn't get it at first. 'Miss Hargrew! Pay attention!' she went on. Of course, that brought me up standing. 'What is a pseudonym?' she wanted to know. How silly! You know the trouble we've been having with that car Father Tom bought. 'I don't know what it is, Miss Carrington,' I told her. 'But if it is something that belongs to an automobile, father will have to buy a new one pretty soon, I'm sure.'"
"And she docked you for that!" exclaimed Jess, as though wildly amazed. "How cruel!"
"Really, I am afraid we are sometimes cruel to our dear teachers," laughed Laura. "But if they are too serious they are such a temptation to us witty ones."
"Now, don't be sarcastic, Mother Wit," said Jess, shaking her chum a little by the elbow. "You know very well you enjoy nagging the teachers a bit yourself, now and then. And Professor Dimp!"
"Oh! Oh! Oh!" gasped Bobby suddenly. "Did you hear the latest about Old Dimple?"
"Now, girls," said Laura, quite sternly, "I refuse to hear of Professor Dimp being made a goose of."
"Gander, dear! Gander!" exclaimed Jess, sotto voce.
"He's an old dear," declared Laura, quite as earnestly. "We found that out, I am sure, when we went camping on Acorn Island last summer."
"True! True!" admitted her chum.
"Oh, nobody wants to hurt the old fellow," chuckled Bobby. "But one day this week there was a bunch of the boys down at the post-office, and Professor Dimp came in to mail a letter. You know he is always reading on the street when he walks; never sees anybody, and goes stumbling about blindly with a book under his nose. He got into the revolving door and Short and Long declares Old Dimple went around ten times before he knew enough to come out--and then he was on the street again and had failed to mail the letter."
"Oh, Bobby!" cried Jess, while Miss Steele was quite convulsed by the statement.
"He's so absent-minded," said Laura sympathetically. "Why didn't Short and Long tell him he was in the revolving door?"
"Humph!" chuckled Bobby, "I guess Short thought the old fellow needed the exercise."
Just then