The Youngest Girl in the Fifth | Page 7

caught, you behave in such a silly,
awkward way that I'm ashamed of you. People will think you haven't
been properly brought up, and blame me. It's not my fault that you've
got no manners."

"I feel as if I don't know where to look when people speak to me, and
as if my hands and feet were too big," protested Gwen. "I can't help
shuffling and wrinkling up my forehead--I can't indeed! You're awfully
hard on me, Bee!"
"Perhaps she'll grow a little more accustomed to her hands and feet
when she's older," suggested Winnie, the peacemaker.
"They're useful for catching chickens at present, and that ought to be
enough for you, Win," laughed Gwen. "You'd have lost those white
Leghorns if I hadn't rescued them."
Winnie was considered chief "henwife" at the Parsonage. She could not
give as much time to the poultry as she wished, and had to delegate
many of her duties to Beatrice, or Nellie, the maid, but nevertheless
held herself responsible for the welfare of her feathered flock. On
Saturdays she delighted to array herself in an overall pinafore and carry
out improvements in the hen-yard. Armed with hammer, nails, and
pieces of wire netting, she would turn old packing-cases into chicken
coops and nesting boxes, or make neat contrivances for separating
various fussy matrons with rival broods of chicks. Winnie was really
wonderfully handy and clever, and albeit her carpentry was naturally of
a rather rough-and-ready description, it served the purpose for which
she designed it, and saved calling in the services of the village joiner,
an economy which her father much appreciated. Winnie was
determined to run her poultry systematically. She kept strict accounts,
balancing the bills for corn and meal against current market prices for
eggs and chickens, and being tremendously proud if her book showed a
profit. On the whole she did well, for the fowls had a free run on the
common at the back of the house, and could thus pick up much for
themselves. With the help of the poultry, and a good vegetable garden,
Beatrice was able to make her small housekeeping allowance supply
the needs of the family, but there were no luxuries at the Parsonage.
The girls possessed few or none of the pretty trifles dear to their sex,
their pocket money was scanty almost to vanishing point, and they had
early learnt the stern lesson of "doing without things". Adversity may
be a hard task-mistress, but she is an excellent teacher in the school of

life, and their Spartan upbringing had given the Gascoynes a certain
resourcefulness and grit of character that they might possibly have
lacked in more affluent surroundings. They were not a perfect family
by any means, and had their squabbles and their cross moods like many
another; but on the whole they were ready to give and take, make
sacrifices for each other, and to try day by day to live a little nearer to
that wonderful high standard that Father ever set before them, and
which he himself followed so faithfully and truly.
CHAPTER III
A False Step
The morning following Gwen's promotion to the Fifth Form was wet,
one of those hopelessly wet October days when the grey sky and the
dripping trees and the sodden grass and the draggled flowers all seem
to combine to remind us that summer, lovely, gracious summer, has
gone with the swallows and left her fickle stepsister autumn in her
stead. It had been raining heavily all night, and it was pouring hard
when Nellie placed the coffee pot and the porridge on the table and
rang the breakfast bell.
"It's an atrocious, abominable morning!" grunted Gwen, peering
disconsolately through the window into the damp garden. "It's sheer
cruelty to be expected to turn out and tramp two miles through the mud.
We oughtn't to have to go to school when it rains."
"Wet at seven, fine at eleven!" chirped Beatrice at the coffee pot.
"It's all very well for you to be cheerful and quote proverbs--you
haven't to go out yourself, Madam Bee!" grumbled Gwen. "I wonder
how you'd like it if--"
"Oh, Gwen, don't whine! Come and get breakfast," interrupted Winnie.
"It's five-and-twenty to eight, and I've a strong suspicion the clock's
late."
"It is," remarked Lesbia calmly, pausing with her porridge spoon

suspended midway between plate and mouth. "Stumps put it back ten
minutes last night when Father wasn't looking. I saw him."
A chorus of united indignation followed her information, each member
of the family trying to bolt breakfast and scold the offender at the same
time.
"We've only five minutes. Oh, you naughty boy!" shrieked Winnie.
"I didn't want to go to bed--I meant to put it on again this morning first
thing--I did, honest," protested Giles, otherwise known