Gertrude W. Morrison

“ Remember Mr. Mann is an instructor, too," said Nellie Agnew.
"That is all right, Doctress," giggled Lily. "Mr. Mann is a good fellow and will not peach."
"Tell us the awful truth, Bobby," drawled Jess. "What is Gee Gee's latest?"
"I understand," said the younger girl, "that she has been to Mr. Sharp and begged him to exercise his authority and make us act 'Pyramus and Thisbe' instead of 'The Rose Garden.'"
"Goodness! That old thing?" flung out Dora Lockwood.
"There is a burlesque on 'Pyramus and Thisbe' that we might give," chuckled Jess. "And it's all in doggerel. Let's!" ”

“ Never had the disagreeable teacher at Central High been so little liked as at this time. They blamed Miss Carrington more than they did Hester.
As the party of troubled girls left the school-house on this particular afternoon, Lily Pendleton ran after them.
"What do you think has happened?" she cried.
"It's something bad, of course," groaned Nellie Agnew.
"Who is hurt?" asked Laura.
"It isn't that," said Lily. "But poor Purt Sweet!"
"Now what has he done?" asked Jess.
"It is what they say he has done, not what he really has done," wailed Lily. "The police have been to his house. ”

“ At this all the girls laughed. Knickers in their gymnasium and field work had become second nature to them.
"But think of me," cried Jess, "in what Chet calls 'the soup to nuts!' Really the dress-suit of mankind is awfully silly, after all."
"And uncomfortable!" declared Dora.
"Attention, young ladies!" exclaimed Mr. Mann at that moment.
He was a rotund, beaming little man, with vast enthusiasm and the patience--so Nellie declared--of an angel.
"Not a full-sized angel," Bobby had denied seriously. "He is more the size of a cherub--one of those you see pictured leaning their elbows on clouds." ”

“ And just at this time recitations seemed to be particularly hard. With rehearsals for the play, and all, mere knowledge was very difficult to acquire.
"I know I'm not half prepared in physics," wailed Nellie Agnew, as she and other juniors trooped into school one day, two weeks before Christmas.
"And I," said Jess Morse, "know about as much regarding this political economy as I do about sweeping up the Milky Way with a star brush."
"How poetic!" cried Laura, laughing. "I wonder if we all are as well prepared?"
"They expect too much of us," declared Dora Lockwood. ”

“ Smoothly the young people wended their way about the ice, their skates ringing, their supple bodies swaying in time to the music, led by those two masks of Uncle Sam and the Red Cross girl.
"It is lovely," Mrs. Belding said to her husband. "What a fine skater our Chetwood is, Henry. And it is so near Christmas! I hope that bank-note will turn out to be a good one so that he will not lose the money," she finished wistfully.
"There, there!" said the jeweler. "I'll go to see Monroe to-morrow. He's at home again." ”

“ I know what would be fine."
"Let's hear it, Laura dear," said Jess, eagerly. "Of course, you would have a bright idea. You always do."
"Why," said the pleased Laura, "if Janet will come and skate with us, she need only wear the very cloak and veil she has on now. What could be more fitting for a leader of our costume parade? The whole carnival is for the Red Cross, and with a Red Cross girl to lead the procession, and Chet in his Uncle Sam suit to lead the boys--Why! it will be the best ever." ”

“ Mr. Belding admonished him. "You will learn after this, I guess, to look at both sides of a hundred-dollar bill--or any other--when it is offered to you."
"Aw, it's a good hundred, I bet," grumbled Chet.
"If it is, I'll add an extra fifty to my Red Cross subscription," rejoined his father with some tartness.
"Well, that's something!" Bobby Hargrew said quickly. "We want to boost the fund all we can. And what do you think?"
"My brain has stopped functioning entirely since I got so bothered by that bank-note," declared Laura Belding, shaking her head. "I can't think." ”

“ The boy's cotton gown flapped across the fire and before he could leap away the flames had seized upon the domino!
"Oh, Billy!" shrieked Laura Belding. "You are on fire!"
The short boy leaped away; but he could not leave the flames behind him. He threw down the torch and tried to tear off the domino. In a moment he was a pillar of flame!
"A blanket! A robe! Quick, Purt!" cried Laura, and started toward the victim of the accident, bare-handed.
For once Purt Sweet did as he was told, and did it quickly. He ran with the robe from the front seat of the automobile. ”

“ More than a thousand dollars--to be exact, one thousand and twenty dollars--had been made for the Red Cross.
Centerport was doing its very best to gather its quota for the great institution that was doing so much good in the world. Janet Steele confessed to Laura that she had gained more than one hundred dollar memberships, and that nearly all of these had given something in addition to their membership fee.
"I wish we girls could help," said Laura wistfully.
"And you having done so much already!" cried Janet. "Why, you've already done more than your share! And doing a play, too!" ”

“ That funny bill he passed on Chet was brand new, too. I wonder if all his money is queer?"
"What do you mean?" asked Janet, wonderingly. "Is the man a criminal, do you think?"
Laura and Jess explained about the peculiarly printed bill, which had given the first named so much trouble in making up her father's accounts the evening before.
"But that may be all explained in time," said Janet.
"All right," grumbled Bobby Hargrew. "But suppose poor Chet has to lose fifty dollars?"
"Father is going to take the bill to the bank to-morrow to see if they can explain the mystery," Laura said. ”

“ The girls had gathered in the main lower corridor of Central High. The bell for classes had not yet rung.
"I'll show you how smart you are, Clara Hargrew!" Hester almost screamed. "I've a good mind to slap you!"
"That might make me smart, Hess," drawled the smaller girl coolly. "But it would not change the facts in the case at all. You are spoiling the whole play--the most effective scenes in it, too--by your obstinacy. Mr. Mann has given you up as a bad egg, that's all. If the play is a failure, it will be your fault."
And for once Laura Belding did not interfere to stop Bobby's tart tongue. ”

“ He got out of the car to come and stand with her on the corner.
"Got your nonskid-chains on, Purt?" asked Laura.
"On the rear wheels? Surely," said Sweet, eyeing the girl in some surprise, because of her question.
"My dear Laura!" cried Mrs. Sweet "Won't you come and talk to me while we are waiting?"
"Can't now, Mrs. Sweet. I am on duty," laughed Laura.
They could not hear what the mayor said, for they were two blocks away. But they had an excellent view of the stand and the Red Cross booth, and the crowd that pressed close to the police ropes. ”

“ Even Lily Pendleton, Hester's last lingering friend, showed a good deal of spleen at Hester's action.
"I never will forgive Hessie," Lily said, almost in tears. And the other girls had to urge her over and over again to be sure and come herself on Thursday for the last dress rehearsal.
"If the piece is wrecked, let us be castaways together," begged Jess. "Don't anybody else fail. Promise, girls!"
They promised sadly. Mr. Mann had hurried away as soon as the last words were said.
"Too disgusted to even speak to us," Nellie said sadly. "I am real sorry for him, girls. He has tried so hard." ”

“ She looked first at the neat figures she had written upon the page of the day ledger, after carefully proving them, and thence at the packet of bills and piles of coin on the desk at her right hand.
"It is the oddest thing that ever happened," she affirmed, as though in answer to her own first declaration.
It was Saturday evening, and it was always Laura's duty to straighten out her father's books for him on that day, for although she was a high school girl, she was usually so well prepared in her studies that she could give the books proper attention weekly. ”

“ Mann I would come here and explain why my niece cannot take part in any such foolish and inconsequential exhibition as this that you have determined on."
She glared around, and the girls' faces assumed various expressions of disturbance. Some, even, were frightened, for Miss Carrington had always reigned by power of fear.
"I would not allow Margaret to lower herself by appearing in such a play. I disapprove greatly of girls taking boys' parts. The object of the play itself is merely to amuse. There is nothing worth while or educational about it." ”

“ Her imprudence--and impudence--was fortunately drowned by the general murmur of objection that went up from the girls of the club. That Miss Carrington's suggestion met with general objection was so plain that even the stern woman herself must have realized it.
"Of course," she said, really "cattish," "you girls would prefer something silly."
"Perhaps, Miss Carrington," said Laura with more boldness than most of her mates possessed, "we prefer something more simple. 'The Rose Garden' does not call for more than we can give to it. I am afraid the play you suggest would take too much study." ”

“ The angry Purt snatched up his game bag and marched away.
"That he's been caught in the trick puts a crimp in him," chuckled Chet Belding.
"And that isn't all that ought to happen to him," muttered Short and Long, who seemed to have become suddenly very bitter against the dandified Sweet.
"Can it, Billy, can it," advised Lance. "Give a calf rope enough and he will hang himself."
"And maybe that fellow ought to be hung," was Short and Long's further comment.
"Why, Billy!" exclaimed Laura, "what ever do you mean?"
"Yes, Short and Long," said Jess. "Why the 'orrid hobservation about poor Purt?" ”

“ She shook her head and looked offended during the remainder of the discussion.
"But you know very well," snapped Lily Pendleton, a rather overdressed girl, as they all crowded out of the schoolhouse after the meeting, "that Gee Gee will do her wickedest to spoil it all."
"Oh, no!" cried Laura. "Not when it is for the Red Cross!"
"It wouldn't matter what the object was," said Jess morosely. "She always does try to crab the game."
"Goodness, Josephine!" gasped her chum, "you are positively as slangy as Chet."
"I guess I catch it from him," admitted Jess Morse. "And she is a crab!"
"Now girls!" ”

“ And finally Purt drove off without returning to the house with the other fellow."
"But who was he?" Jess asked.
"Who?"
"The fellow Purt quarreled with for taking the car."
"Give it up," said Chet, shaking his head.
"And what became of the other man?" Laura queried.
"There were two in the car when it hit the man from Alaska," Jess declared.
"Gee!" ejaculated Bobby. "There's the nine-ten express west"
"Who----What do you mean, young one?" demanded Chet.
"'Young one' yourself!" snapped Clara Hargrew, immediately on her dignity. "There are no medals on you for age, Chet Belding." ”

“ She had proved herself to be a fine and strong skater. Laura and Jess, who sponsored her, were delighted with the new girl's appearance on the ice. She had learned, too, her part quite perfectly. When the girls first came out and the boys darted back to get into their fancy costumes, the summary of the figures the girls wove on the ice were already known to Janet. She fulfilled her part.
Then returned the boys, "all rigged out," Bobby said, and the masquerade parade began. The crowd standing about the arena cheered and shouted. ”

“ Sharp had said.
Dora and Dorothy Lockwood had been insulted and maligned. They did not appear again at that recitation.
"But do you think old Gee Gee would say that she was wrong, and beg their pardon?" demanded Bobby, at recess. "Not on your life!"
"I don't know that a teacher in her situation could publicly acknowledge she was utterly in the wrong," Laura observed thoughtfully.
"I would like to know why not?" demanded Jess Morse.
"Why, you see, the fault really lies upon the conscience of one of us girls," said Laura, looking significantly at Hester. ”