The Youngest Girl in the Fifth | Page 9

to me till next midsummer, and if I have to stop up half the night slogging away at my work!"
"How cross that Gwen Gascoyne looks!" whispered Hilda Browne to Iris Watson.
"Yes, she doesn't seem to want to know us, does she?"
"She needn't, I'm sure. I think she's horrid!"
It was still raining and impossible to go into the playground, so Gwen strolled into the empty classroom, and for lack of anything else to do began arranging and rearranging the contents of her desk. She had not been there more than five minutes when the door opened and Netta Goodwin, one of her new form-mates, entered, humming a tune. She glanced at Gwen, went to her own desk, made a pretence of trying to find a book, sat whistling for a moment or two, then finally turned towards Gwen.
"Well, how do you like being a Senior?" she asked half mockingly.
"Too soon to tell yet," replied Gwen cautiously. "I shall know better at the end of a week."
"You've not had a very charming reception so far, have you? I saw how Rachel and Edith were behaving at dinner."
"I don't care!" snapped Gwen. "I don't want to talk to them, thanks! The Form can please itself whether it's friendly or leaves me alone as far as I'm concerned."
Netta whistled softly. There was a rather inscrutable expression on her face.
"All the same I suppose you don't always want to go on being a kind of leper and outlaw? Not very interesting, I should say, to come to school every day and speak to nobody!"
Gwen was silent. She had no argument to advance.
"They're annoyed with you just at present for being moved into our Form, but they can't keep it up long. In a little while they'll feel accustomed to you and you'll get on all right. Then the question is, are you going to belong to the Saints or the Sinners?"
"What do you mean?" asked Gwen.
"We're all one or other here. We call Hilda Browne and Iris Watson and Louise Mawson and Rachel Hunter and Edith Arnold and a few more 'the Saints'."
"Nothing very saintly about them that I can see!" sniffed Gwen.
"Well, it depends on your standards. Perhaps they thought they behaved like saints at dinner."
"More like Pharisees! Which are you?"
Netta's brown eyes twinkled.
"I leave you to guess!" she replied sagely. "I'm not stiff and stand-off like some of them are, at any rate. If you'd care to take a walk down the corridor, I'll go with you."
A stroll with anyone was better than sitting alone in the classroom; it was still only two o'clock, and there was half an hour to get through before afternoon school began. Gwen was not averse to exploring the upper corridor, for as a Junior it had been forbidden ground to her. She and Netta went into the Sixth Form room, the Senior French and German room, and even looked inside the teachers' room, finding nobody there.
"Miss Roscoe's private sitting-room is at the end of the passage," said Netta. "She's down in the library, so if you like to take a peep, you can."
The spirit of curiosity strongly urged Gwen to see what a headmistress's private study was like, and thinking themselves perfectly safe, the two girls entered, and began eagerly to scan the pictures, the ornaments, the photographs, and the various objects which were spread about on desk and tables. It was a pretty, tasteful room, with choice prints from the old masters in carved oak frames, and pots of ferns and flowers, and handsomely bound books, and curios from foreign lands. The girls moved softly about, examining first one thing and then another with increasing interest.
"Oh, do look at this exquisite little case of butterflies! I never saw anything so perfect!" said Netta.
Gwen was standing absorbed in contemplation of a stained-wood blotter. She wheeled round, and as she did so her elbow knocked a parcel that had been placed on the corner of the desk, and sent it flying on to the floor. There was a smashing sound like the breaking of china, and at that exact moment somebody entered the room. Hopelessly caught, the two girls turned to face the newcomer. It was not Miss Roscoe--that was one thing to be thankful for--but it was Emma, the housemaid, which was quite bad enough. She looked at them as if she knew herself to be mistress of the situation, then waxed eloquent.
"I should just like to know what you two's doing here?" she demanded. "You've no business in this room--none at all. And you've gone and smashed that parcel as is only come five minutes ago from the china shop. I could hear it break. My word! What will Miss Roscoe say to this?"
"She mustn't know!" gasped Netta. "Emma, you must promise us faithfully not to