A Popular Schoolgirl | Page 7

rate."
"What a disappointment for you!" began Beatrice Jackson tactlessly, as
several other girls who were standing near turned and joined the group.
"You always said you were just longing for Rotherwood."
"Do the Red Cross want it again?" queried Jess Howard.
"No, they don't; but we're not going to live there. Where are we going
to live? At our bungalow on the moors, and I'm a weekly boarder at the
hostel. Are there any other impertinent questions you'd like to ask?
Don't all speak at once, please!"
And Ingred, having laced both shoes, got up, seized her pile of books,
and, turning her back on her form-mates, stalked away without a
good-by. She knew she had been rude and ungracious, but she felt that
if she had stopped another moment the tears that were welling into her
eyes would have overflowed. Ingred had many good points, but she
was a remarkably proud girl. She could not bear her schoolfellows to
think she had come down in the world. She had thrown out so many
hints last term about the renewed glories of Rotherwood, that it was
certainly humiliating to have to acknowledge that all the happy
expectations had come to nothing. On the reputation of Rotherwood
both she and Quenrede had held their heads high in the school; she
wondered if her position would be the same, now that everybody knew
the truth.

As a matter of fact, most of the girls giggled as she went out through
the cloak-room door.
"My lady's in a temper!" exclaimed Francie.
"Lemons and vinegar!" hinnied Jess.
"Why did she fly out like that?" asked Beatrice.
"Well, really, Beatrice Jackson, after all the stupid things you said,
anybody would fly out, I should think," commented Verity Richmond.
"I'm sorry for Ingred. I'd heard the Saxons can't go back to their old
house. It's hard luck on them after lending it all these years to the Red
Cross."
"But why aren't they going back?"
"Why, silly, because they can't keep it up, I suppose. If you've any
sense, you won't mention Rotherwood to Ingred again. It's evidently a
sore point. Don't for goodness sake, go rubbing it into her."
"I wasn't going to!" grumbled Beatrice. "Surely I can make an innocent
remark without you beginning to preach to me like this! I call it cheek!"
Verity did not reply. She had had too many squabbles with Beatrice in
the past to want to begin a fresh campaign on the first day of a new
term. She discreetly pretended not to hear, and addressing Francie Hall,
launched into an account of her doings during the holidays.
"We're moving out to Repworth at the September quarter," she
concluded. "And it's too far for me to bicycle in to school every day, so
I've started as a boarder at the hostel. I shall go home for week-ends,
though. Nora Clifford and Fil Trevor are there too. They'll be glad
Ingred's come. With four of us out of one form, things ought to be
rather jinky. Hullo, here they are! I say, girls, let's go to our diggings."
The two girls who came strolling up arm-in-arm were the most absolute
contrast. Nora was large-limbed, plump, rosy, with short-cut hair, a

lively manner, and any amount of confidence. Without being exactly
pretty, she gave a general impression of jolly, healthy girlhood, and
reminded one of an old-fashioned, sweet-scented cabbage rose that had
just burst into bloom. Dainty little Filomena might, on the other hand,
be described as the most delicate of tea roses. She was fair to a fault, a
lily-white maid with the silkiest of flaxen tresses. Her pale-blue eyes,
with their light lashes, and rather colorless little face with its straight
features were of the petite fairy type. You felt instinctively that, like a
Dresden china vase, she was made more for ornament than for use, and
nobody--even school-mistresses--expected too much from her.
Experience had shown them that they did not get it.
For two years, ever since her mother's death, Fil had been a boarder at
the College, and because at first she had been such a pathetic little
figure in her deep mourning, the girls had petted her, and had continued
an indulgent attitude long after the black dress had been exchanged for
colors. If Fil had rather got into the habit of posing as the mascot of the
form, she certainly deserved some consideration, for she was a dear
little thing, with a very sweet temper, and never made any of the
ill-natured remarks that some of the other girls flung about like missiles.
She was so manifestly unfitted to take her own part that somebody else
invariably took it for her.
Verity Richmond, who, with Nora, Filomena and Ingred, represented
VA. in the hostel, was