Though Merle's schoolgirl affections centred in Miss Mitchell, whose modern, up-to-date, twentieth-century methods and opinions entirely appealed to her, Mavis was glad to see something more of Miss Pollard and Miss Fanny. She had loved 'The Moorings' best as it was a year ago, a little 'homey' school, where the classes had been like working with a private governess. She immensely admired the two sweet, grey-haired sisters, with their refined, cultured atmosphere and beautiful, courteous, dignified manner. They seemed the epitome of the nineteenth century, and marked a different era, a something very precious that was rapidly passing away. If flowers are the symbols of our personalities she would have set them down as rosemary and lavender. They had withdrawn almost entirely from teaching, so that the day-girls now saw little of them, but in the hostel they still reigned supreme, and kept to their old custom of amusing the youngest boarders for half an hour before bedtime. The elder ones, owing to the large amount of preparation required under the new regime, could very rarely find time now to come and join this pleasant circle, which met in quite an informal manner in Miss Pollard's room. To Mavis it was a bigger attraction even than tennis, and she would give up her turn at the courts, or would hurry over her home-work, in order to creep in among the juniors for that cosy half-hour.

"Have you written down any more Devonshire folk-tales?" she asked once. "I do so love your stories of the neighbourhood. It makes the pixies seem almost real when you tell about them!"

"They seemed real to the old people from whom I heard them years ago, and who had learnt them from their grandfathers and great-grandfathers. I loved them when I was a child. Yes; they're written in my little manuscript book. I put them carefully down for fear I might forget them. Read you one? If the others would like it! We haven't had a fairy tale for quite a long time, have we, Doreen?"

As the younger children plumped for a story, Miss Pollard fetched her manuscript volume, and hunted for something they had not yet heard. She was a most excellent reader, having that charm of voice and vividness of expression which makes a narrative live before its hearers. It was as if some electric cord linked her with those who listened, and restless little fidgets would sit quite quietly for as long as she chose to go on. The tale which she selected to-night was:

GINNIFER'S DOWRY

In the days when good King Arthur ruled all the west country from Exeter to Land's End, a maiden named Ginnifer lived with her father in a little, round, stone hut on the top of Dartmoor. They were poor, but she was a good girl, and she could spin, and weave baskets, and do many things about the house. One day a young hunter knocked at the door and asked for hospitality, and as there was much game to be had in the neighbourhood he remained for many weeks as a guest of the cottage, going out every day fishing or fowling, and sharing his captures with his hosts. No doubt Ginnifer's blue eyes and gentle glances were the main attraction, and in a short time indeed the young folk became attached to one another. It was only when Ginnifer's father at length questioned the youth, that he confessed to being the son of the great lord of the neighbourhood, who lived in the big Castle beside the river beyond the moor. This was sad news for Ginnifer, for in those days a young noble might not wed with a poor girl, and must marry a bride who could bring a rich dowry with her of jewels and ornaments and silver money. So she quietly told her sweetheart to go back to his father, and learn to forget her; and he went away very sadly, vowing he would get permission to return and marry her, or else he would never wed anyone. When he was gone, Ginnifer went out over the moor among the heather, where she might fight her grief alone, with only the birds and the flowers to see her weep. She lay on the short moorland grass among the sweet bog-myrtle and asphodel, until the sun was setting in a red ball over the hillside. Then, all of a sudden, she heard a rustling and a whispering like countless leaves blown by an autumn wind.

"Who is this?" said a voice. "Who dares to lie in our pixie ring?"

"It's a mortal! A mortal!" cried another.

Ginnifer raised her head. All the moor was alive with tiny pixies, whose green garments were like moving fronds of fern. They crowded eagerly round her.

"It's Ginnifer!" they said. "Ginnifer who lives in the stone hut on the moor! Ginnifer who tended the plover with the broken wing, and watered the harebells that were withering in the burning sun, and who treads so lightly that the birds don't trouble to fly away from her. We know her kindness and her gentle heart, for the 'good folk' watch over the children of the earth, and, unseen, we have followed her through all her simple life. Pretty Ginnifer, tell us your trouble. The pixies cannot bear to see you weep."

They stroked her hair with their tiny fingers, they bathed her eyes with dewdrops and wiped them with the petals of a wild rose. At first Ginnifer was frightened, but the little folk were so kind that she took courage and told them her trouble. They began to dance and jump about with delight, and clapped their little hands.

"Is that all?" they shouted. "Would he wed you if you were a great lady? Tell us what dowry his father would expect his bride to bring?"

"Silks and jewels!" sobbed poor Ginnifer, "and rich embroidered dresses, and trinkets of gold, and caskets of silver money! And I have nothing at all!"

The pixies laughed lustily, throwing up their wee green caps into the air and catching them again for sheer joy.

"Ginnifer dear! We'll find you your dowry! Quick! Let us set to work! We must finish our task before daybreak."

By this time the moon had risen and had flooded the moor with light. Like a flight of busy buzzing bees the little people went flitting up and down. They pulled the gossamer from the gorse bushes and wove it into the finest silk; they caught the great brown moths and sheared their soft fur and spun it on the daintiest little spinning-wheels in the world; and with skilful touches they wove together the harebells and the wild rose petals into the most wonderful of embroidered gowns. The tears which Ginnifer had shed in her sorrow lay shining among the grass, and gathered up by magic fingers they turned into pearls and diamonds fit for a queen. The gorse flowers became golden ornaments, and the little smooth pebbles in the brook changed into pieces of silver money.

The pixies dressed Ginnifer in the softest of the gossamer silk robes, they clasped the golden bracelets round her arms and twisted diamonds into her hair.

"Now she is a fairy princess," they said. "There is none lovelier in all Elfland. We must build her a palace worthy of her!"

Hither and thither they ran, gathering up the dewdrops, and piling them one above the other till the most wonderful Castle rose up on the hillside: as clear as glass, it shone with all the colours of the rainbow, and here they stored the silks and the beautiful ornaments and the caskets of silver money.

Next morning Ginnifer's lover came riding back to tell her that his father forbade the match, but that he meant to marry her whether or no. And lo and behold! he found her at the door of a pixie palace, and directly he set foot inside it, it sank through the ground and carried them both with it into Elfland. And there they have lived ever since, as happy as the pixies themselves, though no one on earth saw them any more. But sometimes when the late sickle moon shines over the moor, travellers who have lost their way have been set in the right path by a lovely lady in gauzy green garments, who sprang up, as it seemed, from nowhere, and vanished away again into the mist, and to this day the children, hunting for bilberries on the hillside, call the shining dewdrops 'Ginnifer's tears.'"

"Have you ever seen any pixies yourself, Miss Pollard?" asked Doreen eagerly.

"No; but I've seen the dewdrops shining just like diamonds, and I've seen the mist make wonderful pixie castles in the moonlight. We can live in a fairy world of our own if we look at the right things. It depends on your eyes. Those people who keep their childhood have the pixies all round them."

"You have!" said Mavis, as Miss Pollard rose to say good-night to her circle of listeners. "You're like Peter Pan, and never grow old!"

"I had such a happy childhood! And it seemed so much the best part of life that I've always been reluctant to let the glamour go. Children ought to be brought up on fairy tales! They're incipient poetry, and should be woven into the web of our lives as a beautiful border, before all the dark prose part follows. If the shuttle only weaves matter-of- fact threads it spoils the pattern!"



CHAPTER XVI

The Tadpole Club

It was quite interesting to be a boarder at 'The Moorings,' though it had its more sober side, particularly for Merle. Her trouble lay in the fact that though she was a school officer from 9 A.M. to 4 P.M., out of those hours her authority was non-existent. Iva and Nesta were hostel monitresses, and they had quite plainly and firmly given her to understand that they did not expect any interference. They were perfectly within their rights, and Merle knew it, but she chafed nevertheless. The fact was that Iva and Nesta, accustomed to the old traditions of 'The Moorings,' when there were only about a dozen boarders, were quite unable to cope with the new order of things, and girls who had been to other schools took decided advantage of their slackness. Merle, whose motto was 'once a monitress always a monitress,' could not see why she might reprove Norma Bradley in the playground, but must allow that damsel ostentatiously to do exactly the same act in the recreation room under her very nose.

"It's so bad for the kids!" she raged. "They know Iva and Nesta are weak and just pretend not to notice, so as to have no fuss. I'm sure Miss Mitchell can't know all that goes on or she'd make some different arrangement. You feel in another element when you get into the hostel. It's 'do as you like and don't bother me so long as you don't go too far and aren't found out.' It might be all very well in the old days last year, but it's wrecking the show now. I wouldn't have believed it if I didn't see it with my own eyes."

The chief offenders were three Third form girls, Norma Bradley, Biddy Adams, and Daisy Donovan, who, with those former firebrands Winnie Osborne and Joyce Colman, had formed a kind of Cabal, whose object seemed to be to find out how far rules might be evaded.

"They've more time than we have, and they simply 'rag' about and 'play the giddy goat'!" complained Merle to her sister.

"They don't seem to have enough to do with their spare time," commented Mavis. "It's all very well to say they must have absolute recreation, but both they and the babies turn it into a sort of bear-garden. You were rather a terror yourself when you were that age! I remember Mother used to quote, 'Satan finds some mischief still for idle hands'."

"Was I? And now I'm a monitress!"

"It makes all the difference when you're in authority, and have some stake in the school."

This chance remark set Merle thinking, and she thought to some purpose. Her natural disposition was always to obtain results by blunt, matter-of- fact methods. In school her policy was, 'Come along with you now, I'm not going to have any nonsense!' Backed by her position, her strong personality, and her prowess at games it succeeded. But here in the hostel, if she wished to effect any improvements, she must go about it another way. The old fable of the wind and the sun would apply, school breezes would be useless, and she must switch on the love-radiator and try smiling.

"I believe I was rather a terror at twelve," she acknowledged to herself. "It's such a tiresome age; you're no longer a pet lamb, and yet you're not a senior. You get all the snubs and none of the kisses. I used to long to do a little bossing on my own, instead of trailing like a comet's tail after the big girls. What those kids want is a properly organised club. They'd work the steam off in that. I've a very good mind to draw up a scheme, show it to Miss Mitchell, and ask her if I may start it among the juniors. If I have her leave, then Iva and Nesta can't call it interfering."

It took Merle a little trouble to evolve her idea, but with a remembrance of Girl Guiding she decided on forming a company corresponding to the Brownies, the objects of which should be to train its members to win various school honours. It was to have its own officers, and its own committees, and to concentrate upon cricket practice, badminton, and net- ball, as well as First Aid, knot-tying, and signalling.

Feeling rather nervous and a little uncertain whether she would meet with approval or a rebuff, she carried her scheme to Miss Mitchell's study. The mistress listened quite composedly and thought for a moment or two.

"You may try it, Merle, if you can persuade the children to join," she said at length. "You have my full sanction, and you may tell them so. We'll see how it succeeds."

It was something to have leave from headquarters. Merle hurried away and lost no time in collecting the junior boarders, who came to her meeting out of sheer curiosity to see what she could possibly want with them. For once blunt plain-spoken Merle was silver-tongued, and advocated her club with all the ingenuity of which she was capable.

"A school is no good if it depends entirely on its elder girls," she said artfully. "In a year or two they'll have left, and it's the middle forms who'll be at the top. If those middle forms will only begin and train themselves now, they'll be champions by the time they reach the Sixth, and there'd be some sense in making fixtures for tennis and cricket. It generally takes a school years before it begins to win matches. Why? Because it must train its champions, of course. You" (nodding at the Cabal) "are the sort who ought to win cups and shields for 'The Moorings' in another four years or so. And it's your business to teach the younger ones. I saw Doreen and Elsbeth playing cricket with Joyce to-day in a way that absolutely made me shudder. She should show them how to hold their bats, and never allow leg-before-wicket even with the veriest kid. It's no use letting them start bad habits, is it? My suggestion is that you form yourselves into a club; let the elder ones be officers, and give efficiency badges for certain things. You've so much more time than we seniors have, that you ought to get on like a house on fire. You'd be laying the foundations of some very good work later on. I should call you the 'Pioneers,' because you'd be starting on a new venture to spread the fame of 'The Moorings.' What d'you think about it?"

The idea decidedly appealed to the juniors. It was far more flattering to be told they were the coming strength of the school than that they were nuisances and in the way of the older girls. Moreover, the notion of being officers was attractive to such temperaments as Winnie's, Biddy's, and Daisy's. They thought they should rather enjoy training the younger ones, and giving their opinions at committee meetings. It was so dull simply to form audiences while the seniors did the talking.

"I vote we do!" said Winnie, looking at the rest of the Cabal, who nodded approvingly in reply.

"Very well. You must organise your own committees, but I think every now and then there should be an inspection to show how you're getting on. You can choose any one you like for your commissioner. A teacher if you want."

"Might as well have you as anybody!" murmured Winnie.

"You can decide that later. What I advise you to do is to hold a committee among yourselves, write down your officers and your rules and everything, and then set to work."

The plan answered admirably, from the mere fact that it gave the restless juniors something definite to do in their recreation time. Instead of tearing aimlessly about and getting into mischief, they suddenly became the most busy little mortals, and absolutely bristled with importance. Their committees were conducted with as much solemnity as the meetings of Cabinet ministers to decide the fate of a nation. They had taken the burden of the future success of the school upon their youthful shoulders, and it gave them huge satisfaction to think that so much depended upon them. They practised cricket quite diligently, and made even the youngest observe the rules, and they bandaged one another's arms and legs in well-meant efforts at ambulance work. Their ambition soared as high as a debating society, where they evidently allowed full freedom of speech on popular topics, for Mavis, by mistake getting hold of one of their secret notices, found the subject for discussion was: "Monnitresses. Are they a Neccessary Evil?"

She showed it to Merle with much amusement.

"I should suggest, 'Need Spelling copy the Dictionary?' for their next debate!" she laughed. "I wish I could creep in, Merle, and hear them slanging you four. I expect they'll give you some hard hits. How priceless they are!"

With the exception of Mavis the elder girls were not entirely in sympathy with the new movement. They considered the Pioneers exhibited signs of swollen head, and nicknamed their society the 'Tadpole Club,' declaring its members to be still in that elementary stage of their development. They made very merry at their expense, and poked fun at Merle for having evolved the idea.

"Have you arranged for the Queen to come down and inspect them?" asked Nesta sarcastically. "No one but royalty is good enough! By the time they've worked their way up into the Sixth the school will be so reformed it'll be a pattern for all England. I think we seniors had better retire gracefully now and have done with it. We don't seem of much account according to their notions. One of them actually had the impudence to criticise my bowling yesterday!"

"Yes; and the little beggar was right too!" put in Iva. "You'll have to buck up over cricket, old sport! It never was your strong point, you know!"

"Well, I'm not going to be corrected by a kid of eleven at any rate!" fumed Nesta.

Though the seniors might be scornful, indignant, or otherwise hostile towards the Tadpole Club, it certainly had the effect of increasing their own efforts and making them keep up their standards. A craze came over the school for physical fitness and efficiency, and the most persistent shirkers were forced by public opinion into exerting themselves. Miss Mitchell said little, but her hazel eyes saw everything that was going on. Her manner towards Merle, which had been rather off-hand, gradually softened, and though she showed her no special favour, she gave her, on one occasion, a word of praise.

"You've shown me that you possess certain powers of organisation, and that you know how to use your influence," she remarked.

And Merle, to whom Miss Mitchell's good opinion seemed almost the most important thing in the world, went about as if she were treading on air, and repeated the precious sentence to herself as proudly as if it were a patent of nobility.

"She wouldn't notice me when I used to bring her flowers!" thought Merle. "It's only when I've done something for the school that she really cares. Some day, perhaps, I'll make her like me for myself!"



CHAPTER XVII

The Fourth of July

Mavis and Merle went home to Bridge House feeling as if they had had a peep at the inner life of 'The Moorings.' They had seen fresh aspects of Miss Pollard and Miss Fanny, and though Merle could not honestly assure herself that she knew Miss Mitchell any better than before, she had at least the remembrance of a few words of approval.

"I'm afraid she's one of those people whom you never do get to know very well!" ruminated Merle. "You go a little way, but never any further. We see the school side of her, and a quite jolly-all-round-to-everybody holiday afternoon side. I wonder what she's like to her private friends, and at home?"

Miss Mitchell, however, was not at all disposed to make a confidante of any of her pupils, particularly of a girl who was not yet sixteen, and much preferred to preserve business-like relations and confine her conversation to school topics, than to give any details of her private life. She made it quite manifest that whoever wished to please her must do so on general and not individual grounds, so Merle accepted the inevitable, and worked very hard in class and at preparation, making a sudden burst of progress in her lessons that astonished herself even more than everybody else. It meant a certain amount of heroism to stick steadily to her books on glorious summer evenings, when even her own family tempted her to play tennis or go out in the car. Most of the other members of the Fifth form showed a marked slacking off in their homework, particularly the day-girls, whose preparation was not regulated. The Castletons, who had another wee baby brother at home, declared they found so much to do on their return that it was impossible to spend long over their lessons.

"Violet's not very strong, and she's often just about done in when we get back," explained Beata to Mavis. "Romola and I take the baby and put the kids to bed, so as to give her a rest. I can't tell that to Miss Mitchell as an excuse for not having touched my Latin, but it's the truth. What else can I do? We've only one maid, and she's busy in the kitchen. Somebody has to look after the children!"

And Mavis, who adored the new Castleton baby, and would have flung lessons to the winds to nurse it, cordially agreed with her.

Another girl whose work suffered in summer, though for a different reason, was Fay. Her father was better in health, but he still needed somebody to interest him and keep him amused, and found no more lively companion than his own daughter. He had taught her to row, and wanted her to go out boating with him now the evenings were so long and light.

"Never mind your prep! It's more important to help to get Father well!" Mrs. Macleod would say. "He looks forward so much to this rowing, and the exercise is good for him. We want a companionable daughter, not a Minerva, and you may tell Miss Mitchell so with my compliments if she grumbles. If we can't have any of your society when you get home, you might as well be away at boarding-school. I bargained with Miss Pollard that you weren't to be overworked."

Fay was clever, and a hasty run through her books usually served to make her pass muster in class. She was a jolly and amusing girl, and was generally the life and soul of the 'sardine' party. She was great chums with the Castletons, though she sparred occasionally with Tattie Carew or with Nan Colville. The latter gave general offence because she always insisted upon taking up more than her fair share of room in the crowded car. She would wear her satchel, and let its knobby corners press against her expostulating neighbour, or she would spread out her elbows instead of keeping them by her side. One day Nan, after a scrimmage on the way to school, begged a lift back from Babbie.

"But we don't go down the hill to Chagmouth," objected Babbie, who had received instructions from her mother to allow the 'sardines' to use their own car, and not to offer to motor any of them. "We turn off at the cross-roads to go to The Warren."

"I know. But you always start first, and you could leave me at the cross-roads, and the others would pick me up as they passed. Be a sport, Babbie!"

"All right. You can come if you like."

Now it happened that Fay overheard Nan telling Lizzie that she would wait at the cross-roads, and further witnessed the magnificent start in the Glyn Williams' car.

"Too good for us to-day, are you?" she murmured. "Then I think you may just do without us altogether! I've got a brain throb! It'll serve you right, Miss Nan Colville!"

Fay went privately to Mr. Vicary and asked him if he would mind driving them home that afternoon by Brendon, which was a slightly different route from their ordinary one.

"I want to call for a parcel there," she explained.

"As it happens, I have an errand I can do there too," agreed Mr. Vicary. "It won't take above five minutes or so longer, I daresay."

"That's all right then. By the by, Miss Colville won't be with us to-day. Miss Williams is motoring her home."

"Yes; I saw them set off."

Fay took care that Lizzie Colville sat at the back of the car that afternoon and not in front with Mr. Vicary. She stifled her objections when they turned off in the direction of Brendon.

"I tell you Mr. Vicary has to go on an errand and so have I, so just shut up! Nan? If she chooses to wait at the cross-roads it's her own fault. She should have come with us."

The 'sardine-tin' entered Chagmouth that afternoon from the direction of Brendon, and Nan, after sitting a long time by the roadside expecting its appearance, gave it up and walked the rest of the way home, very annoyed at the trick that had been played her.

"You shouldn't have let them, Lizzie!" she scolded.

"How could I help it? Fay wouldn't let me speak, and Mr. Vicary just flew on to Brendon. Why didn't Babbie take you into Chagmouth?"

"She never even suggested it. I don't know which is the meaner, she or Fay!" grumbled Nan.

On the Fourth of July, Fay went to school determined to have what she termed 'a real good time,' and to celebrate appropriately the great anniversary of American independence. She armed herself with her national flag and a box of sugared popcorns, a delicacy which was unknown at Durracombe shops, and had been specially sent for from London. As she passed these round generously, the 'sardines' fell in with her mood and vowed to stand by her at school, and help to celebrate the honour and glory of the Stars and Stripes.

"I didn't make much fuss of my own birthday, but I'm wrought up over this!" declared Fay. "It's a shame there isn't a public holiday. I'd like to fire a cannon. Couldn't get any crackers at those wretched shops in Chagmouth either."

"D'you want crackers?"

"Rather!"

"They had a lot of fireworks last November at Hodges' in Durracombe. Perhaps they'd have some left."

"Oh, good bizz! We'll stop in the High Street and see, before we go into school."

They were in excellent time, so they called a halt at Hodges' shop and dismissed the car. The assistant, after searching in various drawers and boxes, produced a small supply of surplus fireworks, which Fay eagerly purchased, being also provident enough to remember to buy a box of matches. She pranced into school in the highest of spirits, flaunting her flag, and stuck it in a conspicuous place in the classroom, where Miss Mitchell eyed it indeed with some astonishment, but offered no remonstrance. At eleven o'clock interval the fun began. Fay and her confederates retired to a secluded part of the garden and began to let off squibs and crackers, the sound therefrom drawing an interested and excited little crowd, who hopped about squealing at the explosions, and were immensely thrilled at the audacity of such a performance on school premises.

"They're great!"

"Hold me down, or I'll fly off in sparks!"

"Fay, you are the limit!"

"It's a brainy notion!"

"Wow! Don't set me on fire!"

"Goody! Here's Miss Fanny coming!"

It was a decidedly wrathful Miss Fanny who descended upon them, and promptly confiscated the few fireworks that were left.

"Most dangerous!" she remarked indignantly. "You might easily, some of you, have been burnt. Really, Fay, I'm surprised. A girl in the Fifth form ought to know better. Go back all of you at once. And don't let such a thing ever happen again!"

The confederates had been lucky enough to have almost finished their display before Miss Fanny appeared on the scene, so they bore the loss of the last three squibs with equanimity.

"If Miss Fanny had only been an American she'd have helped to let them off herself instead of interfering!" protested Fay. "I haven't worked my spirits off yet, so I warn you! We'll do something mad after dinner."

"What?"

"I haven't quite fixed it up yet, but I'll tell you later on."

The girls from Chagmouth dined daily with the boarders in the hostel, and were on very good terms with most of them. Fay could therefore be tolerably sure of a certain amount of support in any scheme she chose to evolve. She thought things over during the French class, a process of mental abstraction which brought the wrath of Mademoiselle on to her head, for she answered at random and made some really idiotic mistakes, at which the other girls giggled.

"You didn't shine this morning, old sport!" whispered Beata when the class was over. "I believe Mademoiselle thought you were ragging her!"

"I wasn't doing anything of the sort. Can't you all realise it's the Fourth of July?"

"You've mentioned that once or twice before!"

"Well, I'll mention it again. Of course I focus my mind on America, not on France! You can't expect me to go jabbering French when I think of the times my friends will be having to-day on the other side of the Atlantic. I've had rather a brain throb though. We'll dress up after dinner in anything we can borrow, and have a parade on the tennis lawn, with prizes for best costumes."

"Who's to give the prizes?"

"I will. I'll ask Maude to buy me some packets of candy when she goes home, and bring them to school this afternoon. They'll do all right."

Fay was discreet enough not to mention her project to Iva or Nesta, in case, being hostel monitresses, they might have felt bound to offer conscientious objections. Members of the Fourth and Third forms, however, jumped at the idea of an impromptu fancy-dress parade, and the moment they were released from the dining-room they tore off to array themselves. It was already a quarter to two, and school would begin again at 2.30, so there was no time to be lost if the thing was to be done at all.

"I give every one a quarter of an hour to dress!" declared Fay. "You've got to be on the lawn when the clock strikes two. Anybody who's late will be disqualified from the competition."

"Who's to judge?" asked Kitty.

"Votes, of course! Don't stand asking questions. Hurry up, if you're going to be in it!"



A quarter of an hour is very scant time in which to robe in fancy costume, but most of the girls had decided during dinner what they meant to be. Romola flew to the kitchen and borrowed an apron from the cook, tied a duster round her head, seized up a pail and a carpet-sweeper, and came as 'Domestic Service.' Beata commandeered the boarders' bath-towels and appeared as an Arab, in robe and turban. Peggie, with her dormitory eider-down for a train, was a court lady. Catie draped a scarf over her hair and shoulders and, holding a bedroom jug aloft on her head, posed as Rebecca at the well. Nan and Tattie, wrapt in identical blankets, were Tweedledum and Tweedledee. Winnie, with a painted moustache and a dressing-gown, was a Turk. Nita slipped on a night-dress and clutched a bedroom candlestick; Joyce rolled an enormous brown-paper cigar which she pretended to be puffing. But perhaps the best of all was Fay herself as the American eagle. She borrowed two mackintoshes and fastened them to her shoulders, securing the other ends to blackboard pointers which she held in each hand. By extending her arms at full width she gave the impression of wings and flapped wildly round the lawn, the illusion being furthered by a brown-paper head-dress with a long twist to resemble a beak.

When the day-girls returned after dinner they were electrified to find this extraordinary assemblage parading upon the lawn. By this time both monitresses and mistresses had caught glimpses from the window and came hurrying out to see what was happening. Fortunately Miss Mitchell, who arrived first on the scene, took it in what the girls called 'a thoroughly sporting fashion.' She laughed, and congratulated the wearers upon the excellence of their hasty costumes.

"We must have another parade some day, when we've more time to prepare for it," she said. "Perhaps I'll come in costume myself then. The American eagle is simply immense! I give Fay my vote for first prize! Hands up all who agree!"

"But I'm giving the prize, so I can't take it myself!" protested Fay.

"That doesn't matter at all if you've won it. I think Tweedledum and Tweedledee should divide the second."

"Best divide the candy all round," said Fay, receiving the packets from Maude, and sharing them among the competitors. "Thanks awfully, Miss Mitchell, for coming to look at us. I couldn't let the Fourth of July go by without taking some notice of it! It wouldn't have been loyal to America, would it?"

"You've certainly stood up for the honour of the Stars and Stripes!" laughed Miss Mitchell. "Now suppose you all go and take these things off again as fast as you can. My watch is exactly right, and the bell will ring in another five minutes."



CHAPTER XVIII

Love-in-a-Mist

The next event of any special importance in the Ramsays' world was Mavis's birthday. She was seventeen now, and was so much taller and stronger since she had come to live in Devonshire that her mother declared their old friends in the north would hardly know her. She was still more fragile-looking than Merle, but her attacks of bronchitis were luckily things of the past, and she was rapidly outgrowing all her former delicacy. Many things which had been prohibited before were allowed her now, and her father's present was a new bicycle and the permission to ride it. Her mother gave her a sketching easel and Merle a camp-stool, for painting was at present her favourite hobby, and Uncle David and Aunt Nellie were lavish in books and music. From Bevis arrived a wooden box containing a kittiwake, which he had stuffed himself, with wings outspread. There was a hook in its back so that it could be suspended by a piece of thread from the ceiling to look as if it were flying. In its beak Bevis had placed a note.

"I didn't shoot it," he explained. "I know you hate to think of any one killing them. I found it dead on the shore, so thought you might just as well have it stuffed."

"I'm so glad it wasn't shot on purpose, poor dear thing!" said tender- hearted Mavis. "Aren't its feathers soft and lovely? I shall hang it to the beam in our bedroom, and it will always seem like a little bit of Chagmouth when we wake in the mornings. It looks just exactly as if it were alive. How clever of Bevis to stuff it so well."

At 'The Moorings' the matter of most vital interest was the arrival of a large wooden hut, which Miss Pollard had bought from the Government, and which was erected in a corner of the garden close to the house. Now that numbers had increased so much in the school extra accommodation was urgently needed, and the new building would serve for a gymnasium, and as a room for lectures and meetings. The great matter for speculation was whether it would be finished in time for term-end festivities. Miss Pollard, urged on by Miss Mitchell, contemplated inviting parents and friends to a formal Speech Day, an affair upon which she had never ventured before. Unless the hut was ready it would be impossible to accommodate so many people, so she hurried on the work and hoped for the best. It was a great amusement to her pupils to watch the various parts being fitted together, and to see the corrugated iron roof fastened on. They rejoiced immensely when at last a flag floated from the top.

"Mr. Perkins says he can undertake to have all perfectly ready by the 25th. I can send out my invitations now!" purred Miss Pollard.

Before Speech Day, however, must come the inevitable examinations. Everybody felt they were much more wearing in July than at Christmas or Easter, owing to the heat, and also to the fact that they covered the work of the whole school year, and not merely that of a single term. Mavis did her utmost but had to struggle with bad headaches, and realised that she had not done herself justice. Merle slogged away grimly, with ink-stained fingers and her hair tied tightly back because of the heat. She had never really taken so much pains over an examination before, and had never found herself so well prepared. Quite to her surprise her brains felt clear and collected, and her mental car seemed to whizz along so fast it quite exceeded the speed limit. No other girl in the form wrote so many sheets as she did or answered such a large proportion of the questions. At the end of the week, tired, nervy, and decidedly cross, she nevertheless felt some satisfaction over the papers she had sent in. Every one in the Fifth had little doubt about the results, and public opinion was justified, for Merle came out top in almost every subject, gaining an average of 91 per cent on the whole exam. She had expected to do well, but was quite staggered at this success, for Muriel, Iva, and Nesta, her usual rivals, were left far and away behind. They were sporting enough to give her their congratulations.

"It means first prize, old thing! Won't we give you a clap as you march on to the platform!" said Iva.

Miss Pollard was determined to do this, her first Speech Day, in style; the chair was to be taken by a local magnate, and the prizes distributed by a real live professor from Oxford, who was spending his vacation in the neighbourhood. There was a tremendous business moving forms and chairs into the newly-erected hut, and decorating the platform with pots of plants and ferns. All the pupils were dressed in white and wore their best hair ribbons. Mavis was feeling sad and sentimental, for it was her last term. She was to leave 'The Moorings' and concentrate her energies on music, and on lessons in painting from Mr. Castleton, which would suit her far better than the strenuous work of the Sixth form. To the girls, and especially the younger ones, this first public function at school was not altogether unmixed bliss. They were obliged to sit as quiet as rows of little angels, packed tightly together on forms without backs, and to listen to interminable speeches about subjects which they only half understood, the main points of which seemed to be, however, that Miss Pollard and Miss Fanny and Miss Mitchell and all the teachers and all the pupils were much to be congratulated, and everybody must remember that 'Rome was not built in a day.'

"Nor the hut either!" whispered Winnie to her chum, applying the proverb too literally. "I wish they'd seen it before the roof was on!"

"'How the creatures talk!'" quoted Joyce, from Alice in Wonderland. "I'm bored to tears!"

The prize-giving part was more interesting. As the names were called, each winner in turn walked up to the platform, received her book, bowed more or less gracefully, and retired. The applause was a welcome relief to the rank and file, who were tired of sitting at such exemplary attention. It was over at last, and the visitors went to be shown round the school and to be regaled with tea in the dining-room. Professor Hartley, in cap and gown, had crossed the garden to the hostel, and the pupils, some of them suffering from pins and needles, were free to disperse. It was the breaking-up for the day-girls, and to-morrow morning the boarders would be sent home.

"Just a word with you, Merle!" said Miss Mitchell, calling the latter into the study by herself. "I want to tell you that I'm pleased with your work. You've made an effort and shown me what you can do. Next term we shall have a Sixth form, and Miss Pollard agrees with me that it will be advisable to appoint a head girl. That position will fall to you, not only because you're top in the exams, but because we think you have fitted yourself to take it. A head girl is no use unless she can lead; I've been watching you all the year, and you've shown me lately that you understand what is expected. The school is still in an elementary stage, but it has improved immensely, and next year I trust you to do your very best for it."

"Oh, thank you, Miss Mitchell!" gasped Merle, almost too overwhelmed for words.

To be thus chosen out and selected by her idol was a most happy ending to the term, and offered golden opportunities in the coming September. It meant more to her even than her prize. She went at once to tell the good news to her sister.

"I don't like to cackle too loudly, because of Muriel and Nesta," said Mavis. "But I am proud of you! It's been worth the grind, hasn't it?"

"Rather! Though I'm yearning for the holidays. Shall we go to Chagmouth on Saturday?"

"Oh, yes! Bevis breaks up to-morrow, and I expect he'll be at Grimbal's Farm by then. It's his last term at school as well as mine. I wonder how he feels about leaving? I promised, too, to call and see the Castletons."

When the girls reached home, there was a letter on the table for Mavis in Clive's handwriting. They heard from the boy every now and then, though he was not a particularly good correspondent. This epistle, which had apparently been penned on Sunday, was mostly a summary of cricket and anticipations of his holidays. It ended:

Your affec'ate coz, CLIVE.

P.S.—Meant to send you this snap before. Isn't it priceless?

The sting of a scorpion is in its tail. Mavis stooped down and picked up the little photo which had fallen from the envelope on to the floor. Clive had used his Brownie camera at Chagmouth and had promised to post them the results, but had forgotten. This solitary print represented Bevis—there was no mistaking Bevis—but Mavis bent over it with puzzled eyes, for clasped tightly in his arms with her head laid upon his shoulder was a girl. Merle, who snatched the photo away to look at it, decided her identity at once.

"Why, it's Romola! That's the artistic blue dress that Violet made for her!"

"So it is! Where's her plait, though?"

"Hidden behind her, I suppose. I say! They're coming it rather strong, aren't they?"

"Yes. I shouldn't have thought that of Bevis!"

"No more should I!" (Merle was looking annoyed.) "I'd no idea he could be so silly. I shall rag him about this, you bet!"

"I wouldn't!" (Mavis's voice was very quiet.) "Romola is so pretty! Perhaps he likes her!"

"Well, it's the first I've seen of it. He's a sly-boots if he does. Somehow it doesn't seem to fit in with Bevis. I'm cross with him. When did Clive take this amazing snap? I wonder he didn't send it on to us before. I think it's not worth keeping, if you ask me!" and Merle, tearing the photo into bits, tossed it into the waste-paper basket.

"Bevis is our friend—not the Castletons'!" she added, stumping away most decidedly cross, "and if he's going in for rubbish like this with Romola, he shan't call me Soeurette again! He needn't think it. I'll not be a sister to Romola! I declare I won't! The sneak!"

But these latter sentiments were muttered to herself, and she took good care that Mavis should not overhear them.

On Saturday morning Merle had a bilious headache, took some breakfast in bed, and announced that she should spend the day lying in the garden. Mavis also began to make excuses for not going to Chagmouth, but Dr. Tremayne pinched her cheek, declared she looked pale, and that the drive would do her good.

"I can't be left without either of my nice little companions!" he complained. "I've got used to having you with me. Besides, Bevis is coming back to-day!"

"I daresay we shall see him next week some time," remarked Mavis demurely. "There's no violent hurry about it."

"Why, no; only—"

"Nonsense, Mavis! Go with your uncle!" broke in Mrs. Ramsay. "This is the first time I ever remember you wanting to stay away from your beloved Chagmouth. What's the matter with you to-day? Don't be silly! Put on your hat and do as you're wanted. I think these exams have thoroughly tired out both of you. You'll feel better after a little air in the car."

Mother's decisions were always final, so Mavis raised no more objections, particularly as Uncle David was looking the least trifle hurt, and he was such a dear that she wouldn't disappoint him for worlds. He had several visits to pay that morning at houses on the way, so it was later than usual when they arrived at Grimbal's Farm. Fortunately there were few patients waiting, and when these were disposed of, Mrs. Penruddock brought in lunch.

"Bevis not come yet?" inquired Uncle David as he lifted the dish-cover.

"No, indeed, Doctor, and I'm anxious about him! His yacht's been at Port Sennen, having some repairs done, and he arranged to go there straight from school early this morning, and sail her round to Chagmouth."

"Well! The lad can handle a yacht all right."

"It isn't that! Bevis knows as much about sailing as most folks. But there's a nasty sea fog come on, and just as it happens the clapper is gone out of the bell by St. Morval's Head. Bevis is always a terrible one for hugging the coast, and I'm afraid if he doesn't hear the bell he won't quite know where he is in the fog, and he may be on the rocks before he knows they're there. I'd have told him it was gone, but there was no time. I only got his letter this morning. Who'd have expected a fog like this either?"

Mrs. Penruddock's apple face looked quite miserable, but sounds of thumping at the back door drew her away from the parlour, and stopped any further confidences. Mavis ate her lunch thoughtfully.

"Is a fog worse on the sea than on land?" she asked at last.

"It is, if you can't tell where you're going. Who's been fooling with the bell at St. Morval's, I wonder? If the clapper has fallen out, they should have had it put in again at once. But that's just the way with them. It's nobody's business, and everybody puts it on to somebody else until there's an accident. I've no patience with them!"

When the meal was over, Mavis went out to take a peep at the sea, or rather where the sea ought to be, for there was nothing to look at but a white wall of mist, long wreaths of which were blowing inland and trailing like ghosts into the town. She came hurrying back very quickly to Grimbal's Farm, and sought the kitchen.

"Mrs. Penruddock, please, may I borrow your big dinner-bell?" she asked.

"Why, yes, my dear! But whatever do you want that for?"

"I'm going to take it to St. Morval's Head and ring it!"

"Bless you! Not a bad idea either! There'd be no harm done anyhow. I'd go with you if I'd the time. Mind your way along that slippery cliff. Pity your sister's not here to-day!"

"I shall be all right, thanks! The fog isn't so bad on land. It's quite easy to see where one's going."

Grasping the big brass dinner-bell, Mavis set forth, and going by a path above the farm, got out on to the cliffs. She knew the way very well, for she had often been before, and had not the slightest fear of getting lost, even if the mist should grow thicker. She walked briskly along, the track in front of her looking quite plain for several yards, though the sea below was completely hidden. She recognised many familiar points en route, the bank where the spleenwort grew, the ruined shed, a supposed relic of smuggling days, the barbed-wire fence, the group of elder trees, and the blackberry bank. When she came to the slanting gorse bushes which overhung the path, she knew she had reached the beginning of St. Morval's Head, and that she must be just about over the spot where the buoy was floating with its clapperless bell.

"It's the story of the Inchcape rock all over again," she muttered, and sitting down on the bracken she began ringing.

It was monotonous work and tiring too. It made her arm ache, and she had to use her left hand for a while instead. She went on persistently, however, for who knew what little yacht might be venturing near the treacherous rocks below. It was an extraordinarily lonely feeling to be there on the cliff by herself, with the white mist round her, as if she were in the midst of the clouds. She would have been chilly only the exercise kept her warm. She was obliged to rest every now and then, but not for long. She did not mean to give in for some time yet. She kept repeating over and over to herself:

'The worthy Abbot of Aberbrothock Had placed that bell on the Inchcape rock. On a buoy in the storm it floated and swung, And over the waves its warning rung.'

The occupation grew so monotonous that she began to feel as if she had been on the cliff for weeks. After what seemed an absolute slice out of eternity, there came a "Hello!" on the path behind her. She stopped ringing and jumped to her feet.

"Bevis! It's never you!"

"Mavis! Did you do all this for me? You trump!"

"Did you hear my bell, then, on the sea?"

"Of course I did, and it gave me my right reckoning. I hardly knew where I was. I might have been on the rocks without. Mrs. Penruddock told me about it, and I came at once to fetch you back."

"I wonder you didn't go to tell Romola you were safe!"

"Romola! Why on earth should I tell Romola?"

Mavis did not reply all at once.

"Only because I thought you seemed particularly interested in her!" she said at last.

Bevis looked frankly puzzled, then his face cleared and he drew a small photo from his pocket.

"Did Clive send you one of these?"

"He did!"

"Well, don't you know who the girl is? Can't you see it's Clive? Clive, dressed up in Romola's togs! Those are hardly Romola's boots, are they? We nearly died with laughing over it. He looked too killing for words. It was Madox who took the snap with Clive's camera."

Mavis, examining the photo by the light of these explanations, had little difficulty in recognising her boy cousin. Bevis was roaring with laughter at the joke, then he suddenly grew serious.

"Mavis!" he said in dead earnest. "You never thought I'd go making such a silly ass of myself with little Romola? That's not in my line at all!"

It was Mavis who did the blushing.

"Look here! We may as well have this out between us. If there's ever to be a mistress at The Warren—and I hope there will some day—I know whom I'd choose! Why, it's Mavis, the one who was good to me when I'd hardly a friend in the world or a name to call myself by, who didn't despise me for being a nobody, and wasn't ashamed to walk with me through the village, and who's kept me off more rocks than she's any idea of, besides what she's done for me to-day! If I asked her some day to think it over, do you fancy she might answer 'yes'?"

THE END