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The Jolliest School of All

by Angela Brazil · English · Gutenberg #20163 · 445,442 chars · public domain (US)

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Title: The Jolliest School of All

Author: Angela Brazil


        
Release date: December 22, 2006 [eBook #20163]
                Most recently updated: January 1, 2021

Language: English

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THE JOLLIEST SCHOOL OF ALL

by

ANGELA BRAZIL

Author of
"The Luckiest Girl in the School," "The Princess of the
School," "A Popular School Girl," "Schoolgirl
Kitty," "Marjorie's Best Year," etc.







A. L. Burt Company
Publishers                        New York
Published by arrangement with Frederick A. Stokes Co.
Printed in U. S. A.
Copyright, 1922, by
Frederick A. Stokes Company
All Rights Reserved




          DEDICATED
          TO

          THE MANY CHARMING AMERICAN
          GIRLS WHOM I HAVE MET

          AND TO

          THOSE UNKNOWN SCHOOLGIRLS
          OVER THE ATLANTIC TO WHOM
          THIS LITTLE BOOK CARRIES MY
          HEARTIEST GREETINGS

[Illustration: "'YOU MEAN THINGS!' RAGED PEACHY"

--_Page 124_]




CONTENTS

    chapter                                page

          I. Off to Italy                     1
         II. The Villa Camellia              16
        III. Hail, Columbia!                 27
         IV. A Secret Sorority               41
          V. Fairy Godmothers, Limited       52
         VI. Among the Olive Groves          66
        VII. Lorna's Enemy                   81
       VIII. At Pompeii                      93
         IX. Reprisals                      113
          X. The School Carnival            126
         XI. Up Vesuvius                    141
        XII. Tar and Feathers               156
       XIII. Peachy's Pranks                174
        XIV. The Villa Bleue                190
         XV. Peachy's Birthday              213
        XVI. Concerning Juniors             230
       XVII. The Anglo-Saxon League         243
      XVIII. Greek Temples                  257
        XIX. In Capri                       272
         XX. The Cameron Clan               287
        XXI. The Blue Grotto                303



THE JOLLIEST SCHOOL OF ALL




CHAPTER I

Off to Italy


In a top-story bedroom in an old-fashioned house in a northern suburb of
London, a girl of fourteen was kneeling on the floor, turning out the
contents of the bottom cupboards of a big bookcase. Her method of doing
so was hardly tidy; she just tossed the miscellaneous assortment of
articles down anywhere, till presently she was surrounded by a mixed-up
jumble of books, papers, paint-boxes, music, chalks, pencils, foreign
stamps, picture post-cards, crests, balls of knitting wool, skeins of
embroidery silk, and odds and ends of all kinds. She groaned as the
circle grew wider, yet the apparently inexhaustible cupboards were still
uncleared.

"Couldn't have ever believed I'd have stowed so many things away here.
And, of course, the one book I want isn't to be found. That's what
always happens. It's just my bad luck. Hello! Who's calling 'Renie'? I'm
here! _Here! In my bedroom!_ Don't yell the house down. Really, Vin,
you've got a voice like a megaphone! You might think I was on the top of
the roof. What d'you want now? _I'm busy!_"

"So it seems," commented the fair-haired boy of seventeen, sauntering
into his sister's room and taking a somewhat insecure seat upon a fancy
table, where, with hands in pockets, he regarded her quizzically. "Great
Scott, what a turn out! You look like a magician in the midst of a magic
circle. Are you going to witch the lot into newts and toads? Whence this
thusness? You won't persuade me that it's a fit of neatness and you're
actually tidying. Doesn't exactly seem _you_, somehow!"

"Hardly," replied Irene, with her head inside a cupboard. "Fact is, I'm
looking for my history book. I can't think where the wretched thing has
gone to. School begins to-morrow, and I haven't touched my holiday tasks
yet; and what Miss Gordon will say if I come without those exercises I
can't imagine. I'm sure I flung all my books into this cupboard, and, of
course, here's the chemistry, which I don't want, but never so much as a
single leaf of the history. Don't grin! You aggravate me. I believe
you've taken it away to tease me. Have you? Confess now! It's in your
pocket all the time?"

Irene looked eagerly at the bulging outline of her brother's coat, but
her newly formed hopes were doomed to disappointment.

"Never seen it! What should _I_ want with your old history book? I've
finished for good with such vanities, thank the Fates!"

"Don't rub it in. It's a beastly shame _you_ should be allowed to leave
school while _I_ must go slaving on at Miss Gordon's. Ugh! How I hate
the place! The idea of going back there to-morrow! It's simply
appalling. A whole term of dreary grind, and only a fortnight's holiday
at the end of it. Miss Gordon gives the _stingiest_ holidays. If my
fairy godmother could appear and grant me a wish I should choose never,
never, _never_ to see St. Osmund's College in all my life again. I'd ask
her to wave her magic wand and transport me over the sea."

Irene spoke hotly, flinging books about with scant regard for their
covers. Her slim hands were dusty, and her short, yellow hair as ruffled
as her temper. There was even a suspicion of moisture about the corners
of her gray eyes. She rubbed them surreptitiously with a ball of a
handkerchief when her head happened to be inside the cupboard. She did
not wish Vincent to witness this phase of her emotions.

"Every girl ought to be provided with a decent fairy godmother," she
gulped. "If mine did her duty she'd come to rescue me now. Yes, she
would, and be quick about it too!"

How very seldom in the course of an ordinary life such wishes are
granted! Not once surely in a million times! Yet at that identical
moment, almost as if in direct answer to her daughter's vigorous tirade,
Mrs. Beverley entered the room. There was a sparkle of excitement in her
eyes, and her whole atmosphere seemed to radiate news. She ran in as
joyously as a girl, clapping her hands and evidently brimming over with
something she was about to communicate.

"Why, Mums! Mums--darling! What's the matter?" asked Irene. "You look as
if you'd had a fortune left you. Tell us at once."

"Not quite a fortune, but next best to it," said Mrs. Beverley, sitting
down on the end of the sofa. "Daddy says I may tell you now, bairns. It
has all happened so suddenly, and has been arranged in a rush. You
remember Dad mentioning a few weeks ago that Mr. Southern, the firm's
representative in Naples, was very ill? Well, Mr. Fenton has decided to
send Dad to Italy to take his place, for a year at any rate, and perhaps
longer. We're to start in a fortnight."

Such a stupendous announcement required a little realizing. Vincent
removed his hands from his pockets.

"You don't mean to say we're _all_ going?" he inquired. "Jemima! Leaving
London fogs and toddling off to Italy? Materkins, you take my breath
away! How's the whole business to be fixed up so soon?"

"Quite easily. We shall let this house, just as it is, to Mr. Atherton,
who will come from the Norfolk branch to fill Father's post in London.
We are to rent Mr. Southern's flat in Naples, while he takes a voyage
round the world to try to regain his health. Dad means to put you into
his office in Naples, Vin. Don't look so aghast! It's high time you
started, and it will be a splendid opening for you. And as for Renie--of
course she's too young to leave school yet----"

"Mums! Mums!" interrupted an agonized voice, as Irene took a flying leap
over her circle of books and, plumping herself on the sofa, clutched
tightly at her mother's sleeve. "You're not going to leave me behind at
Miss Gordon's? You _couldn't_! Oh, I'd die! Mums darling, please! If the
family's going to jaunt abroad I've got to jaunt too! Say yes, quick,
quick!"

"What a little tempest you are! Cheer up! We'd never any intention of
deserting you. We'll stick together for a while at any rate, though when
we arrive in Naples you'll be packed off to a boarding-school, Madam, so
I give you fair warning."

"An Italian school?"

Irene's gray eyes were round with horror.

"No, an Anglo-American school for English-speaking girls. Do you
remember that charming Mr. Proctor who stayed with us last year on his
way from New York to Naples? His daughter is at this school, and he
strongly recommended it. It seems just exactly the place for you, Renie.
It will solve a great problem if we can educate you out there. It would
have complicated matters very much if we had been obliged to leave you
in England. As it is you'll be quite near to Naples, and can come home
for all your holidays."

"Hooray! Then I'm not to go to Miss Gordon's again?"

"As we start in a fortnight it's not worth while your beginning a fresh
term at St. Osmund's."

"Then I needn't bother to find the hateful old history book. I'm _so_
glad I didn't do those wretched holiday tasks--they'd just have been
sheer waste. Mums, I'm so excited! May I begin and pack for Italy now? I
can't wait."

For the next two weeks great confusion reigned in the Beverley
household. It is no light matter to decide what you need to take abroad,
what you wish to lock up at home, and to leave your establishment in
apple-pie order for the use of strangers. Inventories of furniture,
linen, blankets, and china had to be written and checked, a rigorous
selection made of the things to be packed, and the luggage cut down to
the limits prescribed by the railway companies. Poor Mrs. Beverley was
nearly worn out when at last the overflowing boxes were fastened, the
bags and hold-alls were strapped, and the taxis, which were to take them
to the station, arrived at the door. Tears stood in her eyes as she
crossed the threshold of her own house.

"It's a tremendous wrench!" she fluttered.

"Never mind, Mums!" consoled Irene, linking her arm in her mother's.
"It's an adventure, and we all want to go. You'll love it when we're
once off. No, don't look back: it's unlucky! Your bag's in the cab; I
saw Jessie put it in. Hooray for Italy, say I, and a good riddance to
smoky old London! In another couple of days we shall be down south and
turning into Romeos and Juliets as fast as we can. You'll see Dad
learning a guitar and strumming it under your balcony, and serenading
you no end."

"Hardly at his time of life!" said Mrs. Beverley; but the joke amused
her, she wiped her eyes, and, as Irene had hoped and intended, stepped
smiling into the waiting taxi, and left her old home with laughter
instead of with tears.

In her fourteen years of experience Irene had traveled very little, so
the migration to Italy was a fairy journey so far as she was concerned.
To catch the boat express they had made an early start, and they
breakfasted in the train between London and Dover. It was fun to sit in
comfortable padded armchairs, eating fish or ham and eggs, and watching
the landscape whirling past; fun to see the deft-handed waiters nipping
about with trays or teacups; and fun to observe the occupants of the
other tables in the car. There was a fat, good-natured Frenchman who
amused Irene, a languid English lady who annoyed her, an elderly
gourmand who excited her disgust, and a neighboring party, one member of
which at least aroused her interest and caused her to cast cautious side
glances in the direction of the next table. This center of attraction
was a small girl about eight or nine years of age, a dainty elfin little
person with bewitching blue eyes and a mop of short, flaxen curls. She
was evidently well used to traveling, for she would lift a tiny finger
to summon the waiter, and gave him her orders with all the
_savoir-faire_ of an experienced diner-out. Perhaps her clear-toned
treble voice was a trifle too high-pitched for the occasion, and would
have been better had it been duly modulated, but her parents seemed
proud of her conversational powers and allowed her to talk for the
benefit of anybody within ear-shot. That she excited comment was
manifest, for many looks were turned to her corner. The criticisms on
her were complimentary or the reverse. "Isn't she perfectly _sweet_?"
gushed a young lady at Irene's left. "Sweet? She ought to be in the
nursery instead of showing off here!" came a tart voice in reply, from
some one whose face was invisible but whose back and shoulders expressed
an attitude of strong disapproval. "Hope we shan't be boxed up with her
in the same carriage to Paris! I vote we give her a wide berth at
Calais."

Irene laughed softly. The little flaxen-haired girl attracted her; she
felt she would have gravitated towards her compartment rather than have
avoided her. But traveling companions were evidently more a matter of
chance than choice, for the crowd that turned out of the train at Dover
became mixed and mingled like the colored bits of glass in a
kaleidoscope. Irene realized that for the moment the one supreme and
breathless object in life was to cling to the rest of her family, and
not to get separated from them or lost, as they pushed through narrow
barriers, showed tickets and passports, traversed gangways, and finally
found themselves on board the Channel steamer bound for France. Father,
who had made the crossing many times, scrambled instantly for
deck-chairs, and installed his party comfortably in the lee of a funnel,
where they would be sheltered from the wind. Mrs. Beverley, who had
inspected the ladies' saloon below, sank on her seat, and tucked a rug
round her knees with a sigh of relief.

"It will be the 'Black Hole of Calcutta' downstairs," she remarked. "I'd
rather stay on deck however cold it is. The mother of the wee
yellow-haired lassie is lying down already, evidently prepared to be
ill. The stewardess says we shall have a choppy passage. She earns her
tips, poor woman! Thanks, Vincent! Yes, I'd like the air-cushion,
please, and that plaid out of the hold-all. No, I won't have a biscuit
now; I prefer to wait till we get on terra firma again."

Irene, sitting warmly wrapped up on her deck-chair, watched the white
cliffs of Dover recede from her gaze as the vessel left the port and
steamed out into the Channel. It was the last of "Old England," and she
knew that much time must elapse before she would see the shores of her
birthplace again. What would greet her in the foreign country to which
she was going? New sights, new sounds, new interests--perhaps new
friends? The thought of it all was an exhilaration. Others might seem
sad at a break with former associations, but as for herself she was
starting a fresh life, and she meant to get every scrap of enjoyment out
of it that was practically possible.

The stewardess had prophesied correctly when she described the voyage as
"choppy." The steamer certainly pitched and tossed in a most
uncomfortable fashion, and it was only owing to the comparative
steadiness of her seat amidships that Irene escaped that most wretched
of complaints, _mal de mer_. She sat very still, with rather white
cheeks, and refused Vincent's offers of biscuits and chocolates: her
sole salvation, indeed, was not to look at the heaving sea, but to keep
her eyes fixed upon the magazine which she made a pretense of reading.
Fortunately the Dover-Calais crossing is short, and, before Neptune had
claimed her as one of his victims, they were once more in smooth waters
and steaming into harbor.

Then again the kaleidoscope turned, and the crowd of passengers
remingled and walked over gangways, and along platforms and up steep
steps, and jostled through the Customs, and said "_Rien à déclarer_" to
the officials, who peeped inside their bags to find tea or tobacco, and
had their luggage duly chalked, and showed their passports once more,
and finally, after a bewildering half-hour of bustle and hustle, found
themselves, with all their belongings intact, safely in the train for
Paris. Irene had caught brief glimpses of the child whom she named
"Little Flaxen," whose mother, in a state of collapse, had been almost
carried off the vessel, but revived when she was on dry land again: a
maid was in close attendance, and two porters were stowing their piles
of hand-luggage inside a specially reserved compartment. "The cross lady
won't be boxed up with them at any rate," said Irene. "I saw her get in
lower down the train."

It was dark when they arrived in Paris, so Irene had only a confused
impression of an immense railway station, of porters in blue blouses, of
a babel of noise and shouting in a foreign language which seemed quite
different from the French she had learned at school, of clinging very
closely to Father's arm, of a drive through lighted streets, of a hotel
where dinner was served in a salon surrounded by big mirrors, then bed,
which seemed the best thing in the world, for she was almost too weary
to keep her eyes open.

"If every day is going to be like this we shall be tired out by the time
we reach Naples," she thought, as she sank down on her pillow.
"Traveling is the limit."

Eleven hours of sleep, however, made a vast difference in her attitude
towards their long journey. When she came downstairs next morning she
was all eagerness to see Paris.

"We have the whole day here," said Mrs. Beverley, "so we may as well
get as much out of it as we can. Daddy has business appointments to
keep, but you and I and Vin, Renie, will take a taxi and have a look at
some of the sights, won't we?"

"Rather!" agreed the young people, hurrying over their coffee and rolls.

"I wouldn't miss Paris for worlds," added Vincent; "only don't spend the
whole time inside shops, Mater. That's all this fellow bargains for."

"We'll compromise and make it half and half," laughed Mother.

A single day is very brief space in which to see the beauties of Paris,
but the Beverleys managed to fit a great deal into it, and to include
among their activities a peep at the Louvre, a drive in the Bois de
Boulogne, a visit to Napoleon's Tomb, half an hour in a cinema, and a
rush through several of the finest and largest shops.

"It's different from London--quite!" decided Irene, at the end of the
jaunt. "It's lighter and brighter, somehow, and the streets are wider
and have more trees planted in them. It's a terrible scurry, and I
should be run over if I tried to cross the street. The shops aren't any
better than ours really, though they make more fuss about them. The
little children and the small pet dogs are adorable. The cinema was
horribly disappointing, because they were all American films, not French
ones; but that light that falls from the domed roof down on to
Napoleon's tomb was worth coming across the Channel to see. Yes, Mummie
dear, I thoroughly like Paris. I'm only sorry we have to leave it so
soon."

The train for Rome was to start at nine o'clock in the evening, and
immediately after dinner the Beverleys made their way to the station. It
would be a thirty-eight hour journey, and they had engaged two sleeping
compartments, _wagon-lits_ as they are called on the Continental
express. Mrs. Beverley and Irene were to share one, and Mr. Beverley and
Vincent the other. The beds were arranged like berths on board ship, and
Irene, who occupied the upper one, found, much to her amusement, a
little ladder placed in readiness for her climb aloft.

"I don't need to use _that_!" she exclaimed, scrambling up with the
agility gained in her school gymnasium. "How silly of the conductor to
put it for me."

"How could the poor man tell who was to occupy the berth! You might have
been a fat old lady for anything he knew!" replied Mrs. Beverley,
settling herself on the mattress below.

It was a funny sensation to lie in bed in the jolting train, and Irene
slept only in snatches, waking frequently to hear clanking of chains,
shrieking of engines, shouting of officials at stations, and other
disturbing noises. As dawn came creeping through the darkness she drew
the curtain aside and looked from the window. What a glorious sight met
her astonished gaze! They were passing over the Alps, and all around
were immense snow-covered mountains, great gorges full of dark fir
forests, and rushing streams of green glacier water. It was very cold,
and she was glad to pull her rug up, and later to drink the hot coffee
which the _conducteur_ made on a spirit-lamp in the corridor and brought
to those who had ordered it overnight.

Irene never forgot that long journey on the Continental express. The
sleeping compartments became sitting-rooms by day, for the berths turned
into sofas, and a table was unfolded, where it would have been possible
to write or sew if she had wished. She could do nothing, however, but
stare at the landscape; the snow-capped mountains and the great ravines
and gorges were a revelation in the way of scenery, and it was enough
occupation to look out of the window. Switzerland and Northern Italy
were a dream of wild, rugged beauty, but she woke on the following
morning to find the train racing among olive groves and orange trees,
and to catch glimpses of gay, unknown, wild flowers blooming on the
railway banks. Here and there were stretches of the blue Mediterranean;
and oxen and goats in the fields gave a vivid foreign aspect to the
country. Everything--trees, houses, landscape, and people--seemed
unfamiliar and un-English, yet strangely fascinating. The bright land
with its sunshine appeared to be welcoming her.

"I shall like it! I shall like it! I shall like it!" said Irene to
herself, hanging out of the open window of their compartment and
watching some picturesque children who were waving a greeting to the
train. "I _know_ I shall like it!"

"Put your hat on and strap up your hold-all," said Father's voice in
the corridor outside. "Everybody else has luggage ready, and in another
ten minutes or so we shall be in Rome."




CHAPTER II

The Villa Camellia


The Beverleys did not break their journey in Rome, but merely changed
trains and pushed on southward. Irene was sorry at the time not to see
the imperial city, but afterwards she was glad that her first impression
of an Italian town should have been of Naples. Naples! Is there any
place like it in the whole world? Irene thought not, as she stood on her
veranda next morning and gazed across the blue bay to where Vesuvius was
sending a thin column of smoke into the cloudless sky. Below her lay the
public gardens, in which spring flowers were blooming, though it was
only the end of January, and beyond was a panorama of white houses,
green shutters, palm trees, picturesque boats, and a quay thronged with
traffic. To that harbor and that blue stretch of sea she was bound this
very day, for Father and Mother had arranged to take her straight to her
new school, and leave her there before they established themselves in
their flat.

"We haven't any time for sightseeing at present, dear," said Mrs.
Beverley, when Irene begged for at least a peep at the streets of
Naples. "We must put off these jaunts until the Easter holidays. The
term has begun at the Villa Camellia, and you ought to set to work at
your lessons at once. Don't pull such a doleful face. Be thankful you're
going to school in such a glorious spot. We might have left you at Miss
Gordon's."

"I'd have run away and followed you somehow, Mums darling! I don't mind
being a few miles off, but I couldn't bear to feel the Channel and the
whole of France and Switzerland and Italy lay between us. It's too far."

"Yes, our little family quartette is rather inseparable," agreed Mother.
"It's certainly nice to think that we're all 'within hail.'"

The school, recommended to Mr. and Mrs. Beverley by their American
friend, Mr. Proctor, was situated at the small town of Fossato, not far
from Naples. The easiest way of getting there was by sea, so Irene's
luggage was wheeled down to the quay, and the family embarked on a
coasting steamer. Father and Mother were, of course, taking her, and
Vincent accompanied them, because they could not leave him alone in a
strange city.

"It will be your last holiday though, young man," said Mr. Beverley
jokingly, "so make the most of it. To-morrow you must come with me to
the office and start your new career. I don't know whether the Villa
Camellia observes convent rules, and whether you will be admitted. If
not, you must wait outside the gate while we see Miss Rodgers."

"Oh, surely she wouldn't be so heartless?"

"That remains to be seen. In a foreign country the regulations are
probably very strict."

The Beverleys were not the only British people on board the steamer.
Parties of tourists were going for the day's excursion, and as much
English as Italian or French might be heard spoken among the passengers.
Two groups, who sat near them on deck, attracted Irene's attention. The
central figure of the one was a girl slightly taller than herself--a
girl with a long, pointed nose, dark, hard, bright eyes, penciled
eyebrows, beautiful teeth, and a nice color. She was talking in a loud
and affected voice, and laying down the law on many topics to several
amused and smiling young naval officers who were of the party. An elder
girl, like her but with a sweeter mouth and softer eyes, seemed to be
trying to restrain her, and occasionally exclaimed, "Oh, Mabel!" at some
more than ordinary sally of wit; but the younger girl talked on, posing
in rather whimsical attitudes, and letting her roving glance stray over
the tourists close by, as if judging the effect she was making upon
them.

"She's showing off," decided Irene privately. "Is that 'Villa Camellia'
on the label of her bag? I hope to goodness she's not going to school
with me. Hello! Who's that talking English on the other side? Why,
Little Flaxen for all the world! What's she followed us down here for?"

The small, fair-haired girl, whom they had seen in the train to Dover,
was undoubtedly claiming public notice on their right. Her high-pitched,
childish voice was descanting freely about everything she saw, and
people smiled at her quaint questions and comments. Her mother, still
very pale and languid, made no effort to silence her, and her father
seemed rather to encourage her, and to exploit her remarks for the
entertainment of several gentlemen friends.

A little bored by the evident self-advertisement of these rival belles,
Irene moved away with Vincent to a quieter corner of the deck. She was
to see more of them soon, however. They both disembarked when the
steamer reached Fossato, their luggage was piled upon the carriages, and
she watched them drive away up the steep, narrow road that led into the
town.

The Beverleys had decided to have an early lunch at the hotel by the
quay before taking Irene to school. It was their last meal together, so
she was allowed to choose the menu, and regaled the family on hitherto
unknown Italian dishes, winding up with coffee, ices, and chocolates.

"I'm glad you don't cater for us every day, Renie, or I should soon be
ruined," said Father, as the waiter brought him the bill. "Now are you
ready? If we don't hurry and get you up quickly to school we shall miss
the boat back to Naples. Another package of chocolates! You
unconscionable child! Well, put it in your pocket and console yourself
with it at bedtime. The concierge says our _vetturino_ is waiting--not
that any Italian coachman minds doing that! All the same, time is short
and we had better make a start."

In that first drive through the narrow, steep, stone-paved streets of
Fossato Irene was too excited to take in any details except a general
impression of rich, foreign color and high, white walls. Afterwards,
when she came to know the town better, she realized its subtler points.
She felt as one in a dream when the carriage turned through a great
gate, and passed along an avenue of orange trees to a large, square
house, color-washed pink, and approached by a flight of marble steps.
What happened next she could never clearly recall. She remembered the
agony of a short wait in the drawing-room until Miss Rodgers arrived,
how the whole party, including Vincent, were shown some of the principal
rooms of the house, an agitated moment of good-by kisses, then the sound
of departing wheels, and a sudden overwhelming sensation that, for the
first time in her life, she was alone in a foreign land. Foreign and yet
familiar, for the Villa Camellia was a skillful combination of the best
out of several countries. Its setting was Italian, its decorations were
French, and its fifty-six pupils were all unmistakably and undoubtedly
Anglo-Saxon. Irene was assured on this point immediately, for Miss
Rodgers, calling to a girl who was passing down the corridor, gave the
newcomer into her charge with instructions to take her straight to the
senior recreation room.

"Our afternoon classes begin at 2.30," she remarked, "but you will have
just ten minutes in which to be introduced to some of your
schoolfellows. Elsie Craig will show you everything."

Elsie made no remark to Irene--perhaps she was shy--but, starting off at
a quick pace, led her down a long passage into a room on the ground
floor. It was a pleasant room with a French window that opened out on to
a veranda, where, over a marble balustrade, there was a view of an
orange garden and the sea. Round a table were collected several older
girls, watching with deep interest a kettle, which was beginning to
sing, upon a spirit-lamp. They looked up with surprise as Elsie ushered
in the new pupil.

"Hello! You don't mean to tell us there's another of them!" exclaimed a
dark girl with a long pigtail. "We've had two already! Why are they
pouring on us to-day, I should like to know? It's a perfect deluge."

"I hate folks butting in when the term has begun," said another
grumpily.

"We shall be swamped with 'freshies' soon," grunted the owner of the
spirit-lamp. "If they expect coffee I tell them beforehand they just
won't get it."

"She says her name's Irene Beverley," volunteered Elsie Craig, in a
perfunctory voice, as if she were performing an obvious duty and getting
it over.

"Oh, indeed!"

"Well, now we know, so there's an end of it."

It could hardly be called a flattering reception. The general attitude
of the girls was the reverse of friendly. The kettle was suddenly
boiling, and they were concentrating their attention upon the making of
the coffee, and rather ostentatiously leaving the stranger outside the
charmed circle. Irene, used to school life, knew, however, that she was
on trial, and that on her present behavior would probably depend the
whole of her future career. She did not attempt to force her unwelcome
presence upon her companions, but, withdrawing to the window, pretended
to be utterly absorbed in contemplation of the scenery. She kept the
corner of her eye, nevertheless, upon the group at the table. The girl
with the long pigtail had made the coffee and was pouring it into cups.
A shorter girl nudged her and whispered something, at which she shook
her head emphatically. But the short girl persisted.

"I'm superstitious," affirmed the latter aloud. "One's for sorrow, two's
for joy, and three's for luck! She's the third to-day and she may be a
mascot."

"I'd rather have chocolates than mascots," said an injured voice from
behind a coffee-cup.

The chance remark gave Irene the very opportunity she needed. She
suddenly remembered the chocolates her father had handed her before she
left the hotel, and, producing the package, she offered its contents.
After a visible moment of hesitation the girl with the long pigtail
accepted her hospitality, and passed the delicacies round. Instantly all
were chumping almonds, and the icy atmosphere thawed into summer.
Everybody began to talk at once.

"There's a spare cup here if you'd like some coffee. Yes, Rachel, I
_shall_ offer it!"

"I suppose you're over fourteen?"

"We may make coffee after lunch if we're seniors, but the kids aren't
allowed any."

"You've just one minute to drink it in before the bell rings."

"Hustle up if you want to finish it."

"I'll bet a cookie you're a real sport."

"There's the bell! Don't choke or you'll blight your young career."

"We've got to scoot quick!"

"Come along with me and I'll show you where."

Irene, taken in tow by a girl with a freckled nose, was hurried along
the corridor and up the stairs to the classrooms. Although she had
scarcely spoken a word she had undoubtedly gained a victory, and had
established her welcome among at least a section of her schoolfellows.
She did not yet know their names, but names are a detail compared with
personalities, and with some members of the coffee-party she felt that
she might ultimately become chums.

"Don't I bless Dad for those chocs!" she thought as she took her seat
at a desk. "They worked the trick. If I'd had nothing to offer that crew
I might have sat out in the cold forevermore. The dark pigtail is decent
enough, but if it comes to a matter of chumming give me 'Freckles' for
choice."

The Villa Camellia was a high-class boarding-school for
English-speaking girls whose parents were residents, permanently or
temporarily, in the neighborhood of Naples. It was generally described
as an Anglo-American college, for the arrangements were accommodated to
suit the customs of both sides of the Atlantic. Miss Rodgers and her
partner, Miss Morley, the two principals, came respectively from London
and New York; one teacher had been trained in Boston, and another at
Oxford, while the British section of the community included girls from
South Africa, Australia, and New Zealand. Pupils belonging to other
European races were not received, the object of the college being to
preserve the nationality of girls who must of necessity be educated in a
foreign land, and whose parents did not wish them to attend Italian
schools. The arrangements were of course modified by the climate and by
the customs of the country. Outwardly the Villa Camellia resembled a
convent. Its garden was surrounded by immensely high walls edged with
broken glass, and the only entrance was by the great gate, which was
solemnly unlocked by old Antonio, the porter, who inspected all comers
through a grille before granting them admittance. Small parties in
charge of a teacher were taken at stated times for walks or excursions
in the neighborhood, but no girl might ever go out unless escorted by a
mistress or by her parents. The Villa Camellia was a little world in
itself, and as much retired from the town of Fossato as the great, gray
monastery that crowned the summit of the neighboring mountain.

Fortunately the grounds were very large, so there was room for most of
the activities in which the girls cared to indulge. Tennis and netball
were the principal games. There were several courts, and there was a
gymnasium, where the school assembled for exercise on wet days. From two
flagstaffs on the roof floated the Union Jack and the Stars and Stripes
respectively. It was an understood fact that here Britannia and Columbia
marched hand in hand with an _entente cordiale_ that recognized no
distinctions whatsoever.

Miss Rodgers and Miss Morley, who respectively represented the
interests of Britain and America, were tremendous friends. Miss Rodgers
was fair and rather plump and rosy-faced and calm, with a manner that
parents described as "motherly," and a leaning towards mathematics as
the basis of a sound education. Miss Morley, on the contrary, was thin
and dark and excitable, and taught the English literature and the
general knowledge classes, and was rumored--though this no doubt was
libel--to dislike mathematics to the extent of not even adequately
keeping her own private accounts. The pair were such opposites that they
worked in absolute harmony, Miss Rodgers being mainly responsible for
the discipline of the establishment, and acting judge and court of
appeal in her study, while Miss Morley supplied the initiative, and kept
the girls interested in a large number of pursuits and hobbies which
could be carried on within the walls of the house and garden.

As regards the fifty-six British and American maidens who made up this
brisk little community we will leave some of them to speak for
themselves in the next chapter.




CHAPTER III

Hail, Columbia!


Irene, finding herself in her new form, looked round inquiringly. A few
of the girls with whom she had taken coffee were seated at desks in the
same room, but the rest of the faces were unfamiliar. Her teacher
entered her name on the register, and seemed to expect her to understand
the lesson which was in progress, but the subject was much in advance of
what she had hitherto learned at Miss Gordon's, and it was very
difficult for her to pick up the threads of it. She grew more and more
bewildered as the afternoon passed on, and though Miss Bickford gave her
several hints, and even stopped the class once to explain a point, Irene
felt that most of the instruction had been completely over her head. It
was with a sense of intense relief that she heard the closing bell ring,
and presently filed with the rest of the school into the dining-room for
tea. Her place at table was between two girls who utterly ignored her
presence, and did not address a single remark to her. Each talked
diligently to the neighbor on either side, but poor Irene seemed an
insulator in the electric current of conversation, and had perforce to
eat her meal in dead silence. She was walking away afterwards in a most
depressed condition of mind, when at the door some one touched her on
the arm.

"You're wanted in the senior recreation room," said a brisk voice.
"Rachel has convened a general meeting and told me to tell you. So hurry
up and don't keep folks waiting. We want to get off to tennis."

Marveling why her actions should hinder the tennis of the rest of the
community, Irene obeyed the message, and presented herself in the room
where she had been introduced on her arrival. It was now full of girls
of all ages, some sitting, some standing, and some squatting on the
floor. Rachel Moseley, the owner of the long dark pigtail, seemed in a
position of command, for she motioned Irene to a vacant chair, then
rapped on the table with a ruler to ensure silence. She had to tap not
once but several times, and finally called:

"When you've all done talking I'll begin." There was an instant hush at
that, and, though a few faint snickers were heard, most of the audience
composed itself decently to listen to the voice of authority.

"I've called this meeting," began Rachel, "because to-day an unusual
thing has happened. Three new girls have arrived, although the term is
well under way. By the rules of our society they must give some account
of themselves, and we must explain what is required from them. Will they
kindly stand up?"

Blushing considerably Irene rose to her feet, in company with the
dark-eyed damsel who had crossed in the same steamer with her from
Naples, and the fair-haired child whom she had privately christened
Little Flaxen.

"Name and nationality?" demanded Rachel, pencil and note-book in hand.
She wrote down Irene Beverley, British, without further comment; the
fact was evidently too obvious for discussion. At "Mabel Hughes,
Australian, born in Patagonia," she demurred slightly, and she hesitated
altogether at "Désirée Legrand."

"_That's_ not English!" she objected. "We don't reckon to take Frenchies
here, you know!"

"But I'm _not_ French," came the high-pitched voice of the little,
fair-haired girl. "I'm as English as anybody. I am _indeed_!"

"Then why have you got a French name?"

"Legrand isn't French--we come from Jersey."

"Very much on the borderland," sniffed Rachel. "What about Désirée? Not
much wholesome Anglo-Saxon there at any rate."

"I was called Désirée because I was so very much desired. Mother says it
just fits me."

An indignant titter went round the room and Rachel frowned.

"I'm afraid you won't find yourself so much desired here," she said
sarcastically. "I'll enter you British, though I have my doubts. Now
come along, all three of you, and lay your hands on this book. You've
got to take an oath of allegiance. I'll repeat the words, and you must
say them after me:

"'I hereby promise and vow that being of Anglo-Saxon birth I will uphold
the integrity of Great Britain and her colonies and of the United States
of America, and strive my utmost to maintain their credit in a foreign
land.' Now then, do you understand what your oath means?"

Her eyes rested on Irene as she asked the question. That much
embarrassed damsel stuttered hesitatingly:

"We're not to trouble our heads about learning foreign languages?"

A delighted chuckle came from several members of the audience at this
interpretation of the vow. Rachel hastily condescended to explain.

"Oh, no! You'll have to study French and Italian, but what we mean is
for goodness' sake don't stick on all the airs and graces that some of
these foreign girls do. Remember we're plain, wholesome, straightforward
Anglo-Saxons, who play games and say what we mean, and call a spade a
spade and have done with it. Whatever Italian friends you may make
during the holidays please forget them during term-time, and try and
imagine that the Villa Camellia stands in Kent or Massachusetts. Do you
understand my drift now?"

"Oh, yes!" sighed Mabel languidly. "Anglo-American patriotism,
crystallized in a nutshell, I suppose! _I'm_ not going to offend your
prejudices, I'm sure!"

"You'd better not, or you'll hear about it," said Rachel, looking at her
sharply. "Well, girls, that's the wind-up. The three freshies are
admitted and you've witnessed their vows. Just jolly well take care they
keep them, that's all. Juniors are due now at netball practice, and any
seniors who want the tennis courts----"

But Rachel's sentence went unfinished for her listeners were tired of
sitting still, and the second they found themselves dismissed had jumped
up and fled from the room.

"Now that that ordeal's over I guess you may smooth out the kinks in
your forehead, honey!" said a serene voice at Irene's elbow.

Turning quickly she saw the short girl who had braved Rachel's possible
wrath and had offered her coffee on her arrival. It was a pleasant face
that gazed into hers, not exactly beautiful, but with a charm that
eclipsed all mere ordinary prettiness; the sparkling gray eyes were
dark-fringed, the cheeks were like wild roses under their freckles, the
tip-tilted little nose held an element of audacious sauciness, and
dimples lay at the corners of the wide, smiling mouth.

"I'm Priscilla Proctor, called Peachy for short. Oh, yes, I knew all
about you beforehand, although you happen to be the newest girl. Dad
wrote me a whole page--wonderful for him!--and said he'd stayed at your
house in London, and I was to tack myself on to you and show you round,
and see you didn't fret and all the rest of it. Are you wanting a crony,
temporary or otherwise? Then here I am at your service. Link an arm and
we'll parade the place. I guess by the time we've finished there's not
much you won't know about the Villa Camellia."

"Have you been here long?" asked Irene, accepting the proffered arm with
alacrity, and submitting to be led away by her cicerone.

"Just a year. Cried myself to a puddle when I first came, but I like it
now. I didn't realize who you were when you first arrived, or I'd have
given you a tip or two straight away. Thank goodness you're fairly in
favor with Rachel at any rate. Any one who starts by offending her has a
bad term. I don't envy Mabel Hughes. That girl will get a few
eye-openers before she's much older, and serve her right. She rooms with
you? Well, I'm sorry for you. I wish there was a spare bed in our
dormitory, but we're full up to overflowing. Now then, I've brought you
out by the side door to show you what we consider the best view of the
garden. Ah, I thought it would make your eyes pop out! It's _some_ view,
isn't it?"

The garden of the Villa Camellia was certainly one of the greatest
assets of the school, and to Irene, who had been transported straight
from the desolation of a London suburb in January, it seemed like a
vision of a different world. The long terrace, with its marble
balustrade, edged a high cliff that overtopped the sea, while at present
the setting sun was lighting up the white houses of the distant outline
of Naples, and was touching the purple slopes of Vesuvius with gold.
Pillars and archways formed a pergola, from which hung roses and
festoons of the trumpetflower; from the groves near at hand came the
sweet strong scent of orange blossoms, and the little favorites of an
English spring, forget-me-nots, pink daisies, and pansies, lifted
contented heads from the border below. In the basin of the great marble
fountain white arum lilies were blooming, geraniums trailed from tall
vases, and palms, bamboos, and other exotics backed the row of lemon
trees at the end of the paved walk. Here and there marble benches were
arranged round tables in specially constructed arbors.

"These are our summer classrooms," explained Peachy. "When it's
blazingly hot we do lessons here early in the mornings, and it's
ripping. No, we don't use them at this time of the year, because the
marble is cold to sit upon, and the garden is damp really, although it
looks so jolly. You should see it in a sirocco wind! You wouldn't want
to have classes outside then, you bet! It's luck you're in the
Transition form. If you'd been one of Miss Rodger's elect eleven, or one
of Miss Brewster's lambs, I'd have had to chum with you by stealth. I'd
have managed it somehow, of course, to please Dad, but it isn't done
here openly. School etiquette is like the law of the Medes and Persians.
We keep to our own forms. Hello! There's Sheila Yonge. Sheila! If you
can find any Camellia Buds that aren't playing tennis bring them along
right here for a little powwow with Irene."

"Is she a 'buddy' yet?" whispered Sheila.

"Of course not! She's only been here a few hours. What a dear old silly
you are. Hunt up some of that crew all the same, and I'm yours forever.
Don't you understand the situation? Well, Irene's folks entertained Dad
in London and were just lovely to him--nursed him when he was sick and
took him round the shows when he got well. He's been bursting with
gratitude ever since, and he wrote and told me Irene was coming here and
I must pay her out--no, pay her back--pour coals of fire on her
head--Great Scott, I'm getting my similes mixed! I mean give her a right
down good time as far as I can, and make her think the Villa Camellia is
a dandy place. Twiggez-vous, chérie?"

"I twig!" laughed Sheila. "I'll beat up all I can muster," and she ran
lightly away along the terrace.

"A decent girl, though a little hard of comprehension," Peachy nodded
after her. "Doesn't she look adorable in that blue tam-o'-shanter?"

"She's awfully pretty!" agreed Irene readily.

"She'd be the beauty of the school if she'd any idea how to use her
advantages," sighed Peachy. "Give me her complexion and that classical
nose and--well, I guess I'd blaze out into a cinema star before I'd done
with life. I hope she won't be all day raking a few girls together.
She's not what you'd call quick. I've misjudged her. Here she comes with
half a dozen at least--and, oh, no, Sheila! You don't mean to say you've
brought candy? Well, you _are_ a sport! Let's squat under the mimosa
tree and hand it round."

The little group of Peachy's favorite friends who settled themselves
under the yellow mimosa bush to suck taffy and watch the flaming sunset
were all afterwards intimately bound up with Irene's school career. Each
was such a distinct personality that she sorted them out fairly
accurately on that first evening, and decided the particular order in
which they would rank in her affections.

There was Jess Cameron, a jolly Scottish lassie. She rolled her r's
when she spoke, and was a trifle matter-of-fact and practical, but was
evidently the dependable anchor of the rest of the scatter-brained crew,
the one who made the most sensible suggestions, and to whom--though they
teased her a little and called her "Grannie"--they all turned in the end
for help and advice. Jess was slightly out of her element in a southern
setting. Her appropriate background was moorland and heather and gray
loch, and driving clouds and a breeze with fine mist in it, that would
make you want to wrap a plaid round your shoulders and turn to the
luxury of a peat fire. Quite unconsciously she suggested all these
things. Peachy once described her as a living incarnation of one of
Scott's novels, for she was steeped in old traditions and legends and
superstitions, and could tell tales in the gloaming that sent eerie
shivers down the spines of her listeners, or would recite ballads with a
swing that took one back to the days of wandering minstrels. She was not
a girl to make a fuss over anybody, and she did not greet Irene with the
least effusion, but her plain "If you're a friend of Peachy's I'm glad
to see you," was genuine, and better than any amount of gush. Jess
undoubtedly had her faults; she was what her chums called "too
cock-sure," and she was apt to be severe in her judgments, flashing into
the righteous wrath of one whose standards are high, but her very
imperfections were "virtues gane a-gley," and she was a considerable
force in the molding of public opinion at the Villa Camellia.

If Jess, calm, canny, and reliable, stood for the spirit of the North,
attractive, persuasive, fascinating little Delia Watts represented the
South. She came from California, and was as quick and bright as a
humming-bird, constantly in harmless mischief, but seldom getting into
any serious trouble. Her highly strung temperament found school
restrictions irksome, and she was apt to blaze out into odd pranks which
in other girls might have met with sterner punishment. But Miss Morley
had a soft corner for Delia, and, though she did not exactly favor her,
she certainly made allowances for her excitability and her strongly
emotional disposition.

"Delia's like a marionette--always dancing to some hidden string," the
teacher remarked once to Miss Rodgers. "She mayn't be strong-minded but
she's immensely warm-hearted, and if we can only pull the love-string
she'll act the part we want. You can't force her into prim behavior;
she's as much a child of nature as the birds, and if you clip her wings
altogether you take away from her the very gift that perhaps God meant
her to use. Let me have the handling of the little sky-rocket, and I'll
do my best to keep her within bounds, but she's not the disposition to
'be made an example of' or to be set on the 'stool of repentance.' Five
minutes with Delia in private is worth more than a long public
admonition. You've only to look at her face to know her type."

And Miss Rodgers, who stood no nonsense from really naughty and
turbulent girls, yielded in this case, and left the exclusive management
of Delia in the hands of her partner.

Of the seven damsels who sat under the yellow feathery flowers of the
mimosa bush, three of them--Peachy, Jess, and Delia--talked so hard and
continuously that none of the others had a chance to chip in with
anything more than an occasional yes or no. Irene realized in a vague
way that Esther Cartmel was plain and stodgy looking, but that every now
and then a world of light suddenly flashed into her eyes, and
transfigured her for the brief moment; that Sheila Yonge giggled at all
Peachy's remarks, and that Mary Fergusson was a pale and weak copy of
Jess, and slavishly followed her lead in everything. It was the seventh
member of the little party, however, who particularly attracted her
attention. Lorna Carson was quiet, probably from sheer lack of
opportunity to speak, but her pale face was interesting and her dark
eyes met Irene's with a curious questioning glance. It was almost as if
she were asking "Have we known each other before?" Irene could not help
looking at her, and ransacking the side cupboards of her memory to try
to light upon some forgotten clew as to why the face should seem half
familiar.

"Have I seen her in London? Or is she like some one else? No, I can't
fix her at all. Surely I must have dreamed about her," mused Irene,
while aloud she said, almost as if compelled to speak:

"Have you been long at school here? Are you English, or American, or
colonial, or what?"

"A little bit of anything you like," smiled Lorna. "Rachel gets very
muddled about me. I've such a sneaking weakness for Naples that I
believe she thinks I'm an Italian at heart. That's a crime Rachel
absolutely can't forgive. 'Foreign' is the last word in her vocabulary."

"So I gathered when she made me take that oath. I suppose she's head
girl and that's why she rules the roost? Is she decent or does she keep
you petrified? I don't know whether I'm expected to say 'Bow-wow,' or to
listen in respectful humility when she deigns to notice me."

"You'd better not have any 'bow-wows' with Rachel," broke in Peachy,
"though you just jolly well have to wag your tail the way she wants.
She's not bad on the whole, but rather a tyrant, and it would do her all
the good in the world if some day somebody had the courage to knock
sparks out of her. We do what we can in a mild way," (here the other
chuckled) "but she's got the ears of both Miss Rodgers and Miss Morley,
and if you go on the rampage against her you only land yourself in a
scrape. Of course, for purposes of protection the Transition girls have
to unite and----"

"Peachy! Take care!" exclaimed Jess warningly.

Peachy blushed crimson under her freckles.

"I wasn't telling anything!" she retorted. "I suppose Irene----"

"_Do_ shut up!"

"Well Agnes said herself----"

"It doesn't matter what Agnes said."

"She's fixed----"

"Peachy Proctor, if you blab like this you'll be tarred and feathered.
Girl alive, can't you keep a still tongue in your head? If you'd lived
in the Middle Ages you'd have ended your days in a dungeon!"

Jess spoke hotly, and, by the general scandalized look on the faces of
the others, Irene judged that luckless Peachy must have been on the
verge of betraying some secret. She tactfully turned the conversation
with a remark upon the beauty of the sunset, and the clanging of the
garden bell opportunely broke up the gathering, and sent the girls
hurrying helter-skelter along the terrace in the direction of the house.
Irene paused for a moment to look back at the sea and the sky, and the
distant twinkling lights, and to curtsy to the crescent moon that hung
like a good omen in the dome of blue. There was a scent of fragrant
lemon blossoms in the air, and she trod fallen rose petals under her
feet. Suddenly a remembrance of the desolation of Miss Gordon's garden
in a February fog swept across her mental vision. Whatever trials she
might encounter here--and she did not expect her new life to be absolute
Paradise--the environment of this school in the south was perfect and
would make up for many disadvantages.

"Give me sunshine and flowers and I'll always worry on somehow," she
murmured, plucking a little crimson rose, and tucking it into her dress
for a mascot, then ran with flying footsteps under the orange trees to
catch up with her companions, who were already mounting the marble steps
that led to the Villa Camellia.




CHAPTER IV

A Secret Sorority

The dormitories at the Villa Camellia were among the main features of
the establishment, and were a source of considerable pride and
satisfaction to the principals, Miss Rodgers and Miss Morley. They were
always shown to parents as the very latest and newest development of
school arrangements. Some of them were on the second story and some were
on the third, but all had French windows opening onto long verandas on
which were placed large pots of geraniums or oleanders. The walls were
covered with striped Italian papers, the frieze being color-washed and
decorated with designs of flowers or birds, the woodwork was white, the
beds were enameled white, and the blankets, instead of being cream or
yellow as they are in England, were all of a uniform shade of pale blue,
with blue eider-downs to match. The whole of the house was heated by
radiators, so that the dormitories were always warm, and were used as
studies by the older girls, who did most of their preparation there. A
table with ink-pots stood in the middle of each room, and a large notice
enjoining, "Silence during study hours" hung as a warning over every
fireplace.

Irene was given a vacant bed in No. 3 on the second floor, and found
herself in company with Elsie Craig, Mabel Hughes, and Lorna Carson. For
the first two she felt no attraction, but the last excited her interest
and curiosity. There was an air of mystery about Lorna; she asked
questions but gave little information in return on the subject of her
own concerns. Her bright dark eyes were unfathomable, and she "kept
herself to herself" with a reserved dignity not very common among
schoolgirls of her age. Irene, who loved to chatter, found Lorna a ready
listener, and, although the confidence was not reciprocated and in
consequence the friendship seemed likely to be rather one-sided, it was
a friendship all the same from the very start. At the end of the week,
moreover, something important happened to cement it.

For the first seven days of her residence at the Villa Camellia Irene
had felt herself "goods on approval." Peachy Proctor and her chums had
indeed given her a welcome, but afterwards they had held back a little
as if testing her before offering further intimacy. There seemed to be
some secret bond amongst them, some alliance carefully hidden from the
general public. She caught nods, signs, mysterious words, and veiled
allusions, all of which were instantly suppressed when her presence was
noticed. On the eighth day after arrival she found a note inside her
desk. It was marked--

                           PRIVATE

          This must be opened in _absolute seclusion_

                             and

             its contents must be treated with the

                  _Strictest Confidence_

A crowded classroom, with inquisitive form-mates ready to peep over her
shoulder, did not seem the congenial atmosphere for the opening of the
missive, so Irene was obliged to curb her curiosity until mid-morning
"interval," when she gulped her glass of milk hastily, took her portion
of biscuits, and, avoiding conversation, hurried down the garden to the
seclusion of a stone arbor. Here she tore open the envelope, and drew
forth a large sheet of exercise paper. On it was printed in bold black
letters:

"You are elected a member of the Sorority of Camellia Buds. Please
present yourself for initiation to-night at 8.10 prompt in No. 13.
Strictest secrecy enjoined."

There was no signature, but Irene gave a smile of comprehension.
Dormitory No. 13 was shared by Peachy Proctor, Jess Cameron, Delia
Watts, and Mary Fergusson. There was, therefore, little doubt but that
she was to be received into the secret society of whose existence she
had already gathered some hints.

"I'll be there at 8.10," she whispered to Peachy, as they trooped into
the French class.

"Right-o!" replied that light-hearted damsel. "Just one warning--don't
be scared at anything that happens; it's all in fun! Don't say I told
you, though. No, I can't explain. I'm not allowed. You'll soon find
out."

Peachy shook off Irene's company as if in a hurry to get rid of her
before she asked any more questions, so there was nothing to be done but
wait in patience until the evening. Supper was at 7.30, and from 8 till
half past the girls did as they chose. Those who wished to study might
take the extra time for preparation, but work was not obligatory, and it
was an understood thing that in the interval between supper and "set
recreation" visits might be paid to other dormitories, and that so long
as no noise reached the ears of the prefects, anybody disposed to be
frivolous might indulge in a little harmless fun.

Irene's wrist-watch was not a reliable timepiece, having bad habits of
galloping and then suddenly losing, so to-night she did not trust to it,
but sat in the hall with her eyes on the big white-faced clock. At
exactly nine and a half minutes past eight she ran upstairs and tapped
at the door of dormitory 13. There were sounds of scuffling inside and
an agitated voice squealed:

"Wait a minute."

But after a few moments quiet reigned and somebody else called:

"Come in!"

Feeling rather as if she were awaiting initiation into some Nihilist
association Irene entered the room. As she did so a bandage was clapped
over her eyes and she was led forward blindfolded. It was only after an
impressive pause that the handkerchief was removed.

It was well she had been warned beforehand, or the sight which met her
gaze might have caused her to emit a yell loud enough to attract the
attention of a passing prefect. The Villa Camellia was admirably
supplied with electric light, but on this historic occasion the
apartment was illuminated solely by a couple of candle-ends stuck in a
pair of vases. Their flickering flame revealed a solemn row of nine
dressing-gowned figures, each of which wore a black paper mask with
holes for her eyes. The general effect was most startling and horrible,
and resembled a meeting of the Inquisition, or some other society bent
on torture and dark doings. Repressing her first gasp, however, Irene
bore the vision with remarkable equanimity, and advancing towards the
dread figures waited obediently until she was addressed. Evidently she
had done the right thing, for the spokeswoman, clearing her throat,
began in impressive accents:

"Sister Irene Beverley, you are admitted here to-night to be made a
member of our Sorority. Are you willing to join and to take the
pledges?"

"Yes, thanks, but please what's a sorority?" ventured Irene meekly.

Two or three distinct snickers were heard from underneath the black
masks, but a voice murmured, "Order!" and the sounds promptly ceased.

"A sorority is a secret sisterhood," explained the President, "just the
same as a fraternity is a brotherhood. We call ourselves 'The Camellia
Buds,' and we're members of the Transition who have banded ourselves
together for the purposes of mutual protection. It's a great honor to be
elected. There are only nine of us so far, and we've waited ever so long
to choose a tenth. I hope you appreciate the privilege?"

"I do indeed!"

"You're ready to take the vow? Then the initiation may proceed.
Sword-bearers, guard the door, please."

There was a Masonic quality about the proceedings. Two dark figures,
armed with rulers, placed themselves at the threshold, prepared to
settle all intruders, and to preserve the absolute secrecy of the
ceremony.

"Will you give your word of honor to be a loyal member of the Sorority
of Camellia Buds, and never to do a dirty trick so long as you remain at
this school?" asked the President.

"I promise!" replied Irene.

At that somebody switched on the electric light, and the members,
pulling off their black masks, disclosed their laughing faces.

"You stood it A-1. I was quite prepared for you to start hysterics and
had the sal volatile bottle ready right here," chirruped Delia gayly.

"We call it our 'strength of mind' test," explained President Agnes,
blowing out the guttering candles.

"If I _had_ screamed what would have happened?" inquired Irene.

"Probation for another week till you got your nerves. We'd a business
with Sheila just at first; she's rather fluttersome. Well, anyway,
you've got through the ordeal, and now you're a full-fledged 'bud.'
Aren't you proud?"

"Rather! Is the society limited to ten?"

"Sorority, please, not society. It's limited because there isn't anybody
else in the Transition who's worth asking to join. Most of them are a
set of utter sneaks. They may take Rachel's oath about preserving their
nationality and all the rest of it, but if they're to be counted
specimens of Anglo-American honor it makes one blush for one's mother
country whichever side of the ocean it happens to be on. Oh, you don't
know most of them yet! Wait till you find them out."

"You'll be glad then you belong to us."

"Not that we're perfect, of course."

"We don't set up as Pharisees."

"On the whole we're rather a lot of lunatics."

"We just have a little sport among ourselves to keep things humming."

"Well, now Irene understands, we'd best get her fixed up with a 'buddy'
and close the meeting."

"But I _don't_ understand. What, for goodness' sake, is a buddy, and why
must I have one?" demanded Irene tragically.

"Sit down there, child, and let Grannie talk to you," replied President
Agnes. "If you haven't heard of a buddy yet it's time you did. They're
the latest out. They had them at all the camps last summer, in England
as well as in America. A buddy is a chum with whom you're pledged to do
everything, and who's bound to support you. For instance, when the
bathing season is on you must never swim unless your buddy is swimming
with you; if you go on an excursion you stick to each other tight as
glue, and if one of you is lost the other is held responsible. You're as
inseparable as a box and its lid, or the two blades of a pair of
scissors, or a bottle and its cork, or any other things you happen to
think of that ought to go together, and aren't any use apart."

"We only realized buddies last term," explained Peachy, "but the idea
caught on no end. We all went simply crazy over it. I don't mind
guessing that every girl in this school who's worth her salt has got her
buddy. She mayn't let it be known outside her own sorority, but we
aren't blind."

"Are there other sororities in the school then besides the Camellia
Buds?" asked Irene.

"Bless your innocence! I should think there are. There's a rival one in
the Transition. I rather fancy they've snapped up Mabel already. I gave
Winnie a hint she wasn't to tackle _you_, because you'd come to school
with an introduction to _me_, so I ought to have first innings. The
prefects have a sorority all to themselves, and the seniors have one,
and as for the juniors, silly little things, they're as transparent as
glass, with their signaling and their grips and their cypher letters.
Any one can see through them with half an eye. But we're wasting time.
We've got to fix you up with a buddy, and we must be quick before the
bell rings."

"May we choose?" asked Irene, and her eyes fell longingly on Peachy.

"No, we mayn't!" said President Agnes firmly. "We have to take what the
fates send us. It's Kismet. Every time we elect a new member we draw
lots again for buddies. It's a kind of general shuffle. If we're an
uneven number somebody of course has to be odd man out."

"I was the 'old maid' last draw, and I haven't had a buddy this term,"
remarked Sheila plaintively.

"Never mind, ducky! You're bound to find a partner now," consoled Delia.
"It might even be my little self, so live in hope."

"No such luck," groaned Sheila. "I'll probably get Joan, and you know
she always uses me as a door-mat."

Agnes meantime was writing ten names on ten separate pieces of paper and
folding them in identically the same fashion. Peachy offered the loan of
a hat, and into this treasury they were cast and shuffled.

"The newest member draws," murmured Agnes, and the others pushed Irene
forward. She chose two folds of paper at a venture, and twisted them
together, then performed the like service for another pair, until all
the ten were assorted. The thrill of the ceremony was when Agnes opened
the screws of paper and read out the names. Fate had mixed the Camellia
Buds together thus:

          Peachy Proctor--Sheila Yonge.
          Jess Cameron--Delia Watts.
          Joan Lucas--Esther Cartmel.
          Agnes Dalton--Mary Fergusson.
          Lorna Carson--Irene Beverley.

Whether the members of the secret sorority felt satisfied or otherwise
with the result of the shuffle, etiquette forbade them to show anything
but polite enthusiasm. Each took her buddy solemnly by the hand and
vowed allegiance. Peachy then produced what she called "the loving cup,"
a three-handled vase of brown pottery brought by Jess from Edinburgh and
with the motto "Mak' yersel' at hame," on it in cream-colored letters.
It was usually a receptacle for flowers, but it had been hastily washed
for the occasion and filled with lemonade, a rather bitter brew
concocted by Peachy and Delia from a half-ripe lemon plucked in the
garden and a few lumps of sugar saved from tea. This was passed round,
and the Camellia Buds gulped it heroically as a pledge of sisterhood.

"The password is _Thistle-down_," decreed Agnes, as the members, trying
not to pull sour faces, consoled themselves with candy and broke up the
meeting. "Any one who can think of a stunt for next time please bring
along propositions. We're always open to new ideas and ready for a
startler."

As a direct result of her admission to this select sorority Irene found
herself flung by Fate into the arms of Lorna Carson. Had any individual
choice been allowed she would have selected Peachy, Jess, Delia, or even
Sheila in preference, but the lot once cast she must abide by it and be
content. She had a very shrewd suspicion that when the buddies got tired
of each other they elected a fresh member and so necessitated a general
reshuffle of partners, and that her admission to the society had been
welcomed as the pretext for such a change. Here she was, however,
pledged to intimate friendship with Lorna, a girl who half fascinated
and half repelled her, and who, though she might possibly turn out
trumps in the future, was for the present at least most difficult to
understand.




CHAPTER V

Fairy Godmothers, Limited

Irene Beverley, when she first left the shores of her native land, was a
particularly light-hearted, jolly little Britisher, not at all bookish,
and not accustomed to worry her head over any of the deep affairs of
life, but ready to have a royal time with anybody of similar tastes and
inclinations. In her first letter home she summed up the results of a
week's experience.

                                       "THE VILLA CAMELLIA.

         "MUMMIE DARLING,

         "This is to tell you I am still alive! I'm a little
         surprised, because I thought math would kill me.
         Miss Bickford is most _horribly_ conscientious and
         insists upon finding out whether I really
         understand or not, and it is generally 'not.' I
         suppose I was born with a thick head for figures,
         anyway, she seems amazed at my ignorance. I lay the
         blame on St. Osmund's. Is that mean of me? It's my
         only way of paying out Miss Gordon for past scores.

         "I don't mind admitting I have warm times in
         school over some of the classes, but the rest of
         the life is lovely. Miss Bickford is often a big
         thorn, but Peachy is a rose. As for Lorna she's
         like one of those tropical flowers that Uncle
         Redvers grows in his conservatory. How does Vin
         like being at the office? Are you straight yet at
         the flat? Come and see me as soon as ever you can,
         because I'm a little bit lonesome and wanting my
         home folks, though I wouldn't confess it to any of
         these girls for the world.

         "Heaps of love to Dad and Vin and your dear self.

                                            "From

                                                "RENIE."

If Irene, who had found her niche in a congenial set at the Villa
Camellia, was capable of feeling the pangs of homesickness, that
unpleasant malady exhibited itself with far more serious symptoms in the
case of another new girl who had entered the school upon the same day.
Désirée Legrand could not settle down among the juniors. She was used to
the society of grown-up people, and did not take kindly to young
companions. In the excitement of her own affairs Irene had hardly given
the child a thought since her arrival, but one afternoon, when enjoying
a solitary ramble round the garden, she suddenly came face to face with
Little Flaxen. She was shocked at the change in her; the once pink
cheeks were white and pasty, and her eyelids were red and swollen as if
with perpetual crying.

"Hello! Whatever have you been doing to yourself?" exclaimed Irene.
"You look rather a bunch of misery, don't you? What's the matter?"

Désirée, squatting forlornly on the steps that led to the upper tennis
courts, produced a lace-bordered pocket-handkerchief and mopped her
eyes.

"Nobody loves me here!" she blurted out dramatically. "I'm just
wr-r-r-etched! They all laugh and call me Frenchie! I'm not French, and
I w-w-ant to be l-l-oved!"

Irene looked at her and shook her head.

"That's not the way to go about it I'm afraid. I'm sorry, but you know
you'll just _invite_ teasing if you carry on like this. Can't you brace
up and be sporty? Pretend you don't mind anything they say and they'll
soon stop."

"But I _do_ mind!" sobbed the tragic little figure on the steps. "I mind
d-d-dreadfully! Why are they all so horrid to me? People have always
been so nice till I came here!"

"That's exactly the reason," said Irene, grasping the situation and
explaining it truthfully. "You've been accustomed to be petted by
everybody, and after all why _should_ the other girls in your form pet
you? You don't pet _them_, do you?"

"N-n-o!"

Désirée's eyes were round with amazement.

"Well, can't you see school's a matter of give and take? If you do
something for the rest they'll possibly like you, but they won't fall on
your neck just out of sheer good nature. Why don't you write home for a
box of chocolates and offer them round your form?"

"I never thought of it. I had some chocolates--but--I ate them!"

"There you are! You expected to get all the attention and give nothing.
Sorry if I seem brutal, but it's the solid truth. You take my advice and
cheer up instead of continually sniveling. I've been at school myself
since I was seven, and I know a thing or two. If a girl's popular
there's generally some reason behind it. Look here, I'll help you if I
can. Those kids over there are doing nothing. I'll get them to come and
play rounders, choose you for a partner, and I'll back our side to win.
Here's Peachy! Perhaps she'll join in too. I'll ask her."

Irene rapidly explained her philanthropic intentions, and enlisted both
Peachy and Delia in her team. The juniors, amazed and flattered at an
invitation from older girls, were ready enough for a game. Irene
insisted upon the innovation of what she called "hunting in couples,"
that is to say, dividing the company into partners who made the course
hand in hand. She took good care to choose Désirée for her
"running-mate," and as they were both fleet of foot they scored
considerably. By the time the bell rang they had beaten the records.

"Look here!" said Irene, addressing the juniors before they scooted
away, "you kids are missing a chance. Why don't you make Désirée train
for the sports? She can run like a hare! With the start she'd get as a
junior she might win you a trophy. Hadn't it ever entered your silly
young noddles to see what she could do for your form? Well, you are a
set of slackers! That's my opinion of you. We manage our affairs better
in the Transition."

"Oh, thank you! Thank you!" gasped Little Flaxen, lingering a moment or
two behind the others. "You've been just great! I'll write to Dad
to-night to send me some chocs, and I won't eat a single one myself.
They shall have them all. They shall really!"

With scarlet cheeks and shining eyes she was a different child from the
weeping Niobe who had sat and sobbed on the steps.

"Now if I'd simply coddled her and sympathized she'd have cried a few
gallons more and have been no better off," mused Irene, as her protégée
danced away. "I fancy those juniors have been fairly nasty to her,
though I wouldn't tell her so. Something ought to be done about it, but
the question is 'what?' I want to have a talk with Peachy when I can
wedge in ten minutes of spare time."

All evening remembrance of Little Flaxen's red eyes and white cheeks
haunted Irene. She felt it ought not to have been possible for the child
to be so lonely and neglected. Granted that her unpopularity might be
partly her own fault, boycotting was nevertheless hard to bear. It was
clearly somebody's business to have looked after her, and that duty
ought not to have devolved upon a newcomer like herself, who only
realized the necessity by the merest chance.

"What's the use of the prefects?" Irene asked herself, but she gave up
the answer, and appealed to Peachy at breakfast-time instead.

That cheery young American took the matter more seriously than Irene
expected. There was a very kind little heart hidden under her bubbles of
fun.

"I'll call a meeting of the Camellia Buds right now," she declared. "I
guess we don't want any of those poor babes crying their eyes out. Talk
of homesickness! You should have seen me my first week here. I brought
four dozen pocket-handkerchiefs to school with me and I used them all.
It's not good enough! Prefects, did you say? Humph! I don't call Rachel
exactly laid out for this job. Bring your biscuits to the 'Grotto' at
interval, and we'll have a powwow about it."

There was a twenty-minute mid-morning break between classes, during
which the girls ate lunch and amused themselves as they pleased in the
house or grounds. The biscuits, three apiece, were laid out in rows on
the dining-room table together with each pupil's glass of milk. As Irene
ran in to take her portion she heard a scrimmage going on at the other
end of the room. Several small girls were quarreling loudly, and above
the noise came Désirée's piping, high-pitched voice:

"I haven't had a biscuit for days and it isn't fair."

"What's all this about?" asked Irene, striding into the crowd just in
time to see Mabel and another member of the Transition pass, laughing,
through the lower door.

There was a babel in reply.

"Those big girls come and grab our biscuits!"

"It's a shame of them!"

"There ought to be three apiece!"

"And there never are!"

"It's something if you get two!"

"Nancy's taken both mine!"

"Honest injun, I haven't!"

"I tell you I'm famished!"

"Help! Don't all shout at once," decreed Irene. "Let's have a biscuit
parade. Each hold out what she's got. Here, Audley, hand one of yours
over to Francie. Effie, break that one in half and share with Chris.
Désirée, you may have mine this morning, but this business mustn't
happen again. I've no time to stop now, but I'll inquire into this, you
bet!"

Leaving an only partially satisfied group of small girls behind her
Irene sped to her tryst in the garden. She took a short cut, and ran
through the orange grove, where the half-ripe oranges were beginning to
turn yellow on the trees, then shamelessly jumping over a flower border
of stocks and primulas, crossed under the rose-pergola, turned down a
creeper-covered side alley, and found herself in a neglected portion of
the grounds. Here there was a very dilapidated little arbor, built sixty
or seventy years ago when the Villa Camellia had been owned by an
Italian count with a weakness for the fine arts. The roof leaked, and a
riot of jessamine almost hid the door; the window-sill had fallen, and
the floor was a mass of dead leaves. The plastered walls were painted
with frescoes--faded and moldy now--of a country château with cypress
trees, and three ladies in big plumed hats riding on white horses, and a
gentleman in shooting costume and tall boots, who wore side whiskers,
and carried a gun, and had four hunting dogs standing in a row behind
him. All these were rather stiff and badly painted, yet gave an air of
neglected grandeur to the grotto. There were marble seats, and a rickety
marble table, and a little broken statue of Cupid in the corner, and the
floor under the rubbish was of blue glazed tiles, so that the building,
though fallen on evil days, still showed some remnants of its former
glory. As it was in an out-of-the-way spot and far from the tennis
courts, it was not often visited, and had therefore been appropriated by
the Camellia Buds as a suitable place for the secret meetings of their
sorority.

The nine were all assembled here waiting impatiently for Irene. She
brushed through the jessamine-covered doorway, took her seat, and
breathlessly explained the reason of her delay.

"Would you have believed such meanness?" she ended.

Peachy nodded solemnly.

"I told you some of our precious Transition would make you blush. Was
it Bertha? I thought so! I knew she had got hold of Mabel. I believe
they're buddies, and a charming pair they'll be! We shall have to tackle
them somehow. This certainly can't be allowed to go on."

"Isn't it a case for the prefects?" asked Irene, addressing the
President.

Agnes's forehead was drawn into a series of puckers.

"We hate telling," she sighed. "The fact is the prefects in this school
aren't quite what they ought to be. They _think_ they do their duty, but
they're too aloof and high-handed and bossing, and the consequence is
they're not popular, and the girls would as soon complain to a teacher
as to Rachel or Sybil or Erica. It simply isn't done. Yet those kids
need a champion. There are several abuses among them that I've noticed
myself."

"Guess we've got to take it on then and 'champ'," murmured Delia.

"Poor little souls, it's a shame to steal their 'bikkies'; we'll have to
stand over them and act as fairy godmothers," said Sheila.

Peachy bounced suddenly in her seat.

"Sheila Yonge, you've given me an idea--yes, an absolute brain-throb.
What the Camellia Buds ought to do is to turn the sorority into an
Amalgamated Society of Fairy Godmothers, and each of us take over a
junior to look after and act providence to. It's what those kids are
just aching for--only they mayn't know it. What good are prefects to
them except as bogies? They skedaddle like lightning if they see so much
as Rachel's shadow. They each ought to have one older girl whom they can
count on as a friend."

"A kind of buddy?"

"Something of the sort, but more like a foster-mother."

"I vote we ask them all to a candy party, and each adopt one," suggested
Delia warmly.

"There are ten of us, and there are nineteen juniors," calculated Jess.
"How's it going to work out?"

"Why, some of us must take twins or even triplets," decreed Peachy. "I'm
bursting to begin. Let's have that candy party right away. Can anybody
raise a lira or two?"

"We'll give you our subscriptions back in the house, if you'll act
treasurer and wheedle Antonio. Fairy Godmothers, Limited! It's a brainy
notion. When shall you ask those kids? You bet they'll buzz in like
bees."

The loud clanging of the garden bell, which seemed to punctuate life at
the Villa Camellia, broke up the meeting in a hurry and scattered its
members in the direction of their classrooms. At the first opportunity,
however, Irene unlocked her cash-box and took out a contribution towards
the candy party. She was not yet used to the Italian paper money, and
had only a vague idea of its value, but she judged that two lire was the
expected amount, and carried it accordingly to Peachy's dormitory.

"You white angel! It's a bountiful 'contrib.' I've squared Antonio.
He'll leave the parcel inside the grotto. What we should do without that
dear old man I can't imagine. I've told the juniors, and they're simply
crazy to come. I've fixed it up for directly after tea."

Antonio, the old concierge who had charge of the gate, was absolutely
faithful to his duties as porter, and guarded the Villa Camellia as
zealously as a convent, but he was lenient on one point--he was willing
sometimes to smuggle sweets, and those girls who knew how to coax could
induce him to make an expedition to the confectioner's and fetch them a
small private store of what delicacies they fancied. He had his own
ideas of how much was good for them, and would never be responsible for
more than a limited allowance; neither would he undertake more than one
commission per week for any single girl. It was a matter of favor, and
to some of the pupils he would only grunt a refusal. Peachy, however,
was a champion wheedler; she had a certain command over the Italian
language, and could persuade Antonio, in his native tongue, of the
absolute necessity of her demands. He was quite generous on this
occasion, and slipped a fair-sized parcel of mixed Neapolitan bonbons
into the sanctuary of the deserted summer-house.

Nineteen interested juniors, bidden to an unwonted entertainment,
dodged their prefect after tea, evaded a basket-ball practice, scattered
themselves in the grounds, met in the long pergola, and proceeded to the
jessamine-covered arbor, where they were received politely by their ten
hostesses. It was, of course, impossible to accommodate them inside, but
the grotto was close to the place where Paolo, the gardener, chopped
wood for the stoves, so there were plenty of logs lying about that
served as seats. In a very short time the guests were settled,
hospitality was handed round, the colored papers were removed from the
goodies, and there was a general abandonment to sticky satisfaction.
Between the first and second distributions Agnes, as President of the
Sorority, addressed the meeting.

"We've a proposition to make to you all," she began. "There are some
things in this school that aren't always quite what they ought to be,
and it's rather hard for juniors to fight their own battles. Sometimes
you squabble among yourselves--oh, _I_ know!--and sometimes you get it
hot from the seniors or the Transition. Well, we're going to help you.
Each of us means to take on one or more of you and be a sort of fairy
godmother to you, and responsible for seeing you're decently treated. I
understand there's been a little trouble about your lunch biscuits?"

"It's Bertha!"

"And Mabel!"

"They're real mean!"

"They simply grab them!"

"Oh, do please stop it!"

"And we haven't had our turns at the tennis courts!"

"And Winnie borrowed my paint-box and won't give it back!"

Agnes held up a hand to stop the general clamor.

"That'll do!" she decreed. "I'm going to sort you out and give you each
to your fairy godmother, and you may pour your woes into her ears, and
she'll try her level best to right your wrongs. No, you _mayn't_ say
whom you'd like to have. It's _we_ who'll do the choosing, thanks!
Anybody who's not satisfied can walk off and she won't get a champion at
all or any more candy either. I mean what I say."

Such an awful threat reduced the juniors to order, and they submitted
quite peaceably to be apportioned among their various benefactresses.
Irene secured Little Flaxen, Lorna had a pair of solemn-eyed sisters,
Peachy pounced upon the liveliest trio and proclaimed them as her
triplets, and Delia adopted the two youngest as twins.

"You can come to us at a pinch," explained Agnes, "but please remember
we're Fairy Godmothers, _Limited_. We'll fight any just crusade, but
we're not going to write your exercises for you, or pull you out of
scrapes when you don't deserve it. That's not our function. There, you
understand? Hand the candy again, somebody. There's another piece each
all round at least, and if there are any over I'll throw them up and you
shall scramble for them."

The immediate effect of this mission of the Camellia Buds was a decided
improvement in the conditions of the juniors. Next morning, at
lunch-time, a stern-faced contingent mounted guard over the biscuits,
and when Bertha and Mabel, plainly bent on piracy, sauntered down the
room, they were told certain unpalatable home truths, and ignominiously
put to rout.

"Stop that instanter!" commanded Peachy.

"We're here to see fair play!" snarled Jess.

"Be content with your own portions!" flared Delia.

"Well, really! Who asked you to boss _us_?" retorted Bertha angrily.

"Nobody; but we're going to stop your mean tricks, so we give you
warning. You two are a disgrace to the Transition. I don't know what
flags you class yourselves under, but I'm sure neither America nor
Britain would be proud to own you--you biscuit-snatchers!"

Peachy's eyes were snapping sparks, and the matter might have waxed even
warmer had not Rachel reëntered the room for a pencil she had dropped.
The head prefect pricked up her ears at the sound of the disturbance,
whereupon Mabel and Bertha, who knew they would receive short shrift if
she demanded an explanation, made a hasty exit, merely murmuring to Jess
and Peachy as they pushed past them:

"We'll pay you out for this!"

"Just you wait!"




CHAPTER VI

Among the Olive Groves


Quite by accident as it seemed, the Sorority of the Camellia Buds had
turned itself from a society instituted for mutual protection and fun
into a Crusaders' Union, pledged, like Spenser's Red Cross Knight, to
avenge the wrongs of distressed damsels in the junior forms. The ring of
battle certainly added a spice of excitement to their secret. It was
much more interesting to interfere personally on behalf of their
protégées than to place debatable matters before the prefects. If war
were involved with another sorority it could not be helped. And war
there undoubtedly was. Bertha and Mabel, too clever to court open
ignominy, desisted for the present from biscuit-snatching, but sought
other means of retaliation. It was unfortunate for Irene and Lorna that
Mabel had been apportioned to them as a roommate. Both she and Elsie
were members of the rival sorority, so there was division in No. 3
dormitory. Sometimes the opposing factions would not speak to one
another at all. Elsie was more stand-off than actively disagreeable and
kept herself to her own cubicle, but Mabel was openly annoying. She
transgressed every rule of dormitory etiquette, dashed for the bathroom
instead of waiting her due turn, dumped her belongings on to other
people's chairs, spread the center table with her papers, fidgeted
during study hours, and in various ways made herself objectionable.

Irene and Lorna, as sworn buddies, cemented yet more firmly the bond
between them, and supported one another on every possible occasion.
Irene was really growing fond of Lorna. Though the latter might be
reserved it was something to find a ready listener and sympathizer. As a
rule we can't deliberately choose our soul-friends. Fate just seems to
send them along and we must accept them with all their faults or go
without. It certainly does not do to be too particular, or we may soon
find ourselves chumless in the world. Irene was rather lovelorn for
Peachy, but that bright little American, besides being in an upper
dormitory, was before-appropriated by other "heart-to-hearties," and,
though she held out the palm of good fellowship, was too staunch a
character to desert old friends for new.

"She's just sweet to me, but I don't count first," decided Irene. "Well,
it's no use being jealous. If you can't have the moon you must be
content with a star, that's all. It's a vast amount better than
nothing."

Lorna might more aptly be described as a planet than a star, for her
thoughts had started to revolve round Irene in a fixed orbit. As regards
her half of the bargain she was absolutely content. She adored her
buddy, and blessed the lot that had coupled their names together. She
had not before made a real friend, and Irene's happy-go-lucky,
affectionate, confiding disposition appealed to her. She began to try to
protect her and look after her. It was really something of the mother
instinct cropping out. She had never possessed a sister or anything
little of her own to love, and it was a new experience to find a girl,
rather small and younger than herself, who clung to her and seemed
actually fond of her. Life, which had hitherto been chilly and
self-centered, suddenly grew warm. She had been used to pose as one who
disliked school, but with this fresh interest her views on the subject
underwent a change.

Any girl must indeed have been hard to please who was not satisfied
with the Villa Camellia and its beautiful Italian garden. All through
the month of February flowers were in bloom there which in England only
peep out timidly in April or May, and often will not brave a northern
climate at all. The front of the house was covered with a glorious
purple bougainvillea, violets bloomed under the orange and lemon trees,
and the camellias, from which the villa took its name, flourished in
profusion, growing as great trees ten or twelve feet high and covered
with rose-colored, white, or scarlet blossoms. Iris, freesias,
narcissus, red salvias, marguerites, pansies, pink peonies, wallflowers,
polyanthus, petunias, stocks, genistas, arbutula, cinerarias, begonias,
and belladonna-lilies kept up a brave display in the border, and, though
they would be more beautiful and luxuriant later on in the season, they
nevertheless dispelled the idea of winter. The general temperature at
Fossato resembled an English April, the sunshine was warm, but the wind
was apt to be chilly, and at night-time it was quite cold, though never
frosty. The central heating apparatus was kept going in the school, and
the girls, though they might run about without coats in the sunshine,
were always required to have a warm jersey at hand, for the wind at this
season could be treacherous, and those unused to the climate, deceived
by its brightness and wealth of flowers, were very liable to catch
chills and to be laid up with feverish colds as the result of their own
imprudence. Sometimes indeed a bitter sirocco wind would blow, and bring
torrents of rain to turn the blue sea and sky to a leaden gray and to
blot out the view of Naples and Vesuvius, but it seldom lasted more than
a few days, and in a land of drought was welcomed to refresh the gardens
and to fill the cisterns and water-tanks.

It has been mentioned in a previous chapter that the Villa Camellia was
of necessity run somewhat on convent lines. In Italy young girls do not
walk about unchaperoned as in England and America, but are always very
closely escorted by older people, and it was advisable to keep to the
customs of the country. The pupils obtained most of their exercise
inside their own garden. On Sundays they paraded to the British church,
but otherwise they did not very often go into Fossato. Once a week, if
the weather were fine, a limited number were taken for an expedition,
but Irene had been at school for some weeks before this good fortune
fell to her lot. One lucky Wednesday, however, she found her name and
Lorna's written on the list of "exeats" on the notice-board, and flew to
announce the glad tidings to her chum.

"Twelve of us, with Miss Bickford and Miss Parr as leaders. Won't it be
ripping? It says Monte Pellegrino. Where's that? The big hill over
there? Oh, great! I love a climb! I'm just dancing to go! I feel as if I
had been boxed up inside these big walls for years and years. I only
wish Peachy and Delia had been on the list too."

"But we are!" exclaimed Delia's excited voice behind her. "Stella and
Marjorie both have colds, so we've swapped places with them, and they'll
go next time instead. Isn't it fine!"

"I'm tingling right down to my toes," agreed Peachy, her jolly little
freckled face one wide grin. "It's going to be an afternoon of
afternoons."

"If it doesn't rain," said Lorna, eyeing the sky suspiciously.

"Oh, don't be a wet blanket! It's no use courting trouble, honey, as
Willy Shakespeare says somewhere. Oh, well, if it wasn't Willy
Shakespeare it was somebody else who said it, and it's just as true
anyway. Take your umbrella and wait till the rain comes down before you
grumble. I've got an exeat and I didn't expect it, and I'm going off my
head a little. That's all! Don't worry yourselves about me. I'm sane at
the bottom."

With Peachy and Delia prancing about and hardly able to regulate their
satisfaction the expedition promised to be a lively one, though the
harum-scarum pair calmed down in the presence of Miss Bickford, and
assumed a deportment of due decorum. The favored twelve were half
seniors and half Transition, the remaining pair of the latter consisting
of Bertha Ford and Mabel Hughes. The Camellia Buds exchanged eloquent
glances at the sight of their arch-enemies, but wisely forbore to make
any provocative remarks; Delia indeed even murmured something pleasant
about the excursion to which Bertha grunted a reply, so the party
started off in apparent harmony.

Antonio, with his big key, unlocked the great gate, they filed through
into the eucalyptus-shaded road, and in ten minutes they had left the
quiet school behind them, and were down in the gay little town of
Fossato. It was new and wonderful to Irene. The wide main street with
its intense brilliant sunshine contrasting with the deep shade of the
narrow side streets, the open shop-fronts with their displays of
picturesque wares, the stalls of fruit and vegetables sold by quaint
country vendors, the balconies full of flowers, the kindly, dark-eyed,
smiling people, the pretty peasant children clattering about in heelless
wooden shoes, the brightly painted carts and the horses decorated with
flowers and feathers as if for a perpetual May Day, all made up a scene
that was more like a portion of a play than a piece of real life, and
made her almost able to imagine herself upon the stage of a theater.
They had reached a great square, where leafless trees were covered with
a beautiful purple blossom, something like mezereon. From a marble
fountain bareheaded women, with exquisitely arranged dark tresses and
bright handkerchiefs folded shawl-wise round their shoulders, were
drawing water in brass pitchers, and chattering the soft southern
dialect with the pretty tuneful Neapolitan voices that speak like
singing and sing like opera. An equestrian statue of Garibaldi stood on
a pedestal in the midst of a flowerbed of gay geraniums, and below, in
the shadow, a military officer, with a gorgeous pale blue cloak draped
over one shoulder, was talking to two Italian soldiers whose plumed hats
were adorned with shining cocks' feathers.

Miss Bickford, in the van of the Villa Camellia queue, strode on,
taking no notice, beyond a firm shake of the head, of the various
interruptions that met her path--the drivers who offered their carriages
for hire, the smiling women who thrust forward baskets of oranges for
sale, the beguiling children who held out little brown hands and begged
for _soldi_ (halfpennies), and the post-card vendors who spread out sets
of colored views of the neighborhood. It was a good thing that Miss Parr
was at the rear of the procession to keep order, or the girls would have
succumbed to some of these temptations and have broken rank, an
unpardonable offense in the eyes of the school authorities, who wished
to keep up the prestige of their establishment in the estimation of the
town, and to emulate the convent school on the hill, whose pupils
marched along the high street as demurely as young nuns.

Turning out of the piazza they walked alongside a deep natural gorge
which divided Fossato from the open country. This immense ravine was a
fearsome place, with a sheer descent of many hundreds of feet; its
jagged rocks were clothed with bushes and creepers, and clefts and the
openings of caves could be seen amongst the greenery. The girls leaned
on the low wall and shuddered as they gazed down the precipice.

"Antonio and Dominica say that dwarfs live in the caves down there,"
remarked Peachy. "Half the people in the town believe in them, but
they're too afraid to go and see because the dwarfs have 'the evil eye,'
and would bring them bad luck."

"What superstitious nonsense!" laughed Rachel. "How _can_ they make up
such stuff?"

"Not altogether such nonsense as you think," corrected Miss Bickford,
who was a student of archæology; "indeed _I_ find it intensely
interesting. It's a case of survival of tradition. A few thousand years
ago no doubt a race of little short dark Stone Age men actually lived in
those caves, and took good care to avenge themselves on any of the
taller, stronger tribes who interfered with them and tried to push them
out of their territory. The remembrance of them would be handed down
long after they had become extinct, and, of course their doings were
exaggerated, and their cunning tricks were set down to magic. Just as
the prehistoric monsters lingered as dragons and firedrakes, so the
small early inhabitants of Europe have passed into dwarfs and brownies
and pixies. If anybody cared to dig in those caves I dare say flint
weapons might be found. It's a chance for the local antiquarian society
if they'd only take it."

Leaving the gorge the party turned up a steep and very narrow alley
between walls nine or ten feet high. At the tops of these walls were
raised gardens planted with orange and lemon trees, whose fruit, in all
stages of green, gold, and yellow, overshadowed the path. Across some of
them were erected shelters of reeds or plaited grass, to prevent too
quick ripening, but in some of the orchards the crop was ready, and
workers were busy with ladders and baskets gathering their early
harvests. It was a picturesque route, for the sides of the deep walls
were covered with beautiful maidenhair ferns, and over the tops hung
geraniums or clumps of white iris or purple stocks or clusters of little
red roses. Here and there, at a corner, was a wayside shrine with a
faded picture of the Madonna, and a quaint brass lamp in front, and
perhaps some flowers laid there by loving hands; dark-eyed smiling
little children were playing about and giving each other rides in
home-made hand-carts, and at one point the girls stood aside to let pass
a donkey so loaded with tiny bamboo trees that it looked a mere moving
mass of green.

At length the deep alley between the orange orchards gave way to a
different scene. They had been climbing steadily uphill, and now found
themselves above the fruit zone and among the olive groves. The high
walls had disappeared, and the path ascended by a series of steps. Gray
olive trees were on either side, and on the bordering banks grew lovely
wild flowers, starry purple anemones, jack-in-the-pulpit lilies, yellow
oxalis, moon-daisies, and the beautiful genista which we treasure as a
conservatory plant in England. As it was country the girls were allowed
to break rank, and keenly enjoyed gathering bouquets; they scrambled up
the banks, vying with one another in getting the best specimens. The
view from the heights was glorious: below them stretched the gray-green
of the olive groves, broken here and there by the bright pink blossoms
of a peach tree; the white houses of Fossato gleamed among the dark
glossy foliage of its orange orchards, and beyond stretched the
beautiful bay of Naples, with its sea a blaze of blue, and old Vesuvius
smoking in the distance like a warning of trouble to come.

It was at this point of the walk that Irene, foolish, luckless Irene,
made a fatal mistake, and, as Miss Bickford afterwards told her,
"wrecked the whole excursion and spoiled everybody's pleasure." She
beckoned Lorna and ran up a hill to obtain a higher vantage ground,
then, instead of descending by the route she had come, she insisted upon
taking a short cut to rejoin the path and catch up with the rest of the
party. Now neither Lorna nor Irene was aware that the mountain was a
network of many paths leading to little vineyards and gardens, and that
when they ran down the opposite side of the slope they were striking a
fresh alley, altogether different from the one along which Miss Bickford
was leading her flock. For quite a long way the two girls walked on,
thinking they were in advance of the others and had stolen a march upon
them. Then they sat down and waited, but nobody came. It was a
considerable time before it dawned upon them that they were separated
from the rest of the party.

"We've come wrong somehow," said Lorna, in much consternation.

"What had we better do?"

"I don't know."

"Perhaps they're not far off. I'll try if I can make them hear."

"I wouldn't shout," objected Lorna, but she was too late, for Irene
was already letting off her full lung power in a gigantic coo-e-e. It
had a totally different effect from what she anticipated. No schoolgirls
with Villa Camellia hats made their appearance, but some rough looking
Italian youths scrambled over a fence and came sniggering towards them.
Their manner was so objectionable and offensive that the girls turned
and ran. They pelted down the path anywhere, quite oblivious of the
direction they were taking, and, as a matter of fact, branching yet
farther away from their original route. They could hear footsteps and
giggling laughter behind, and they were growing extremely terrified when
to their immense relief they saw in front of them an elderly peasant
woman coming from the town. She had a bright yellow handkerchief round
her neck and carried on her head a big basket containing flasks of oil,
loaves of bread, and some vegetables. She stopped in some astonishment
as Lorna and Irene rushed panting up to her, then glimpsing the lads she
seemed to grasp the situation, and called out angrily to them in
Italian, whereupon they promptly and rapidly disappeared. As she had
reached the gateway of her own garden she motioned the girls to enter,
and they gladly availed themselves of the opportunity to seek sanctuary.
A large archway led into a paved courtyard, on one side of which was a
little brown house, and on the other a small chapel, quite a picture
with its quaint half-Moorish tower and two large bells. Their new friend
seemed to be the caretaker, for she escorted them inside to show them,
with much pride, an altar-piece attributed to Perugino and some ancient
faded frescoes of haloed saints. She gave them a peep into her house
too, and they were deeply interested to see the unfamiliar foreign home,
not comfortable according to British or American ideas of comfort, but
with a certain charm of its own. There was a big dark room on the ground
floor with an orange press, various agricultural implements, and
numberless baskets for gathering fruit; there was a bare kitchen with a
wood fire and a table spread with cups and dishes; then up a winding
stair was a bedroom with walls colored sky blue, and a veranda that
looked down over a glorious orange orchard.

"Oh, I'd adore to go out there!" said Irene, pointing to the path that
led between the fruit-laden trees, and their hostess evidently divined
her meaning, for she not only led her guests into the garden, but
fetched a ladder, climbed a tree, and plucked each of them a whole
cluster of oranges surrounded by a bunch of leaves.

The girls were so delighted with their entertainment in this Italian
cottage that they hardly wished to tear themselves away, yet a vision of
Miss Bickford's reproachful face began to hover before their eyes, and
Lorna at last suggested that they must be moving.

"I hope those abominable boys aren't waiting about anywhere outside,"
shivered Irene.

The same thought seemed to have struck their hostess, for she called an
elderly man, evidently her husband, who was pruning vines, and began a
catechism as to where her visitors lived. Lorna replied as well as her
knowledge of Italian allowed, and at the mention of the Villa Camellia
the pair nodded in comprehension. After a brief conversation with his
wife in an undertone the old man offered himself as guide, and undertook
to escort the truants safely back to school again, a proposal which they
thankfully accepted. It would indeed have been difficult for them to
find their own way among the various interlacing paths, and they were
particularly glad to have his protection against possible _ragazzi_.
There was tremendous trouble waiting for them at the Villa Camellia.
Poor Miss Parr had collapsed almost into hysterics, and Miss Bickford
with two other teachers had returned to the hillside on a further
search, while Miss Rodgers was communicating by telephone with the
Fossato police station, and offering a reward for any news of their
whereabouts. Irene had thought the principal could be stern, but she
never knew how her eyes could flash before that interview in the study.
Both girls came out quaking like jellies and weeping for all to hear.

"Did you catch it hot?" inquired Peachy, sympathetically linking arms
with the truants.

"Rather! It isn't the punishments so much, it's that she made us so
_ashamed_."

"Our parole won't be trusted till after half-term."

"We didn't _mean_ to run away."

"It was really quite an accident."

"Cheer up!" consoled Peachy. "Miss Rodgers cuts like a steel knife, but
she doesn't bear grudges. I will say that for her. With some teachers
you'd never hear the last of it, but once you've worked off your
impositions you'll be quite in favor again. Whatever possessed you to go
and do it though?"

"Just our wretched bad luck, I suppose," said Irene, rubbing her eyes
as she turned up the passage and deposited her confiscated cluster of
oranges, as directed, in the pantry.




CHAPTER VII

Lorna's Enemy


For the next two weeks Irene and Lorna were strictly "gated," a great
deprivation, for it would have been their turns to go shopping with Miss
Morley, and Irene at least was anxious to sample some of the quaint
wares spread forth so temptingly in the Fossato stores. With the
exception of church-going they did not have a chance to step outside the
grounds of the Villa Camellia. The Sunday expedition came as a welcome
relief to break the monotony. The school liked the little British church
at Fossato. It was so utterly different from anything to which they had
been accustomed in England or America. To begin with it was not an
ecclesiastical building at all, but simply a big room in the basement of
the Hôtel Anglais. The walls had been exquisitely decorated by a French
artist with conventionalized designs of iris in purple and gold, and
through the windows there was a gorgeous peep over the bay. The girls
used to exercise much maneuvering to secure the seats with the best
view, and somehow that bright stretch of the Mediterranean seemed to
blend in as part and parcel of all the praise and thanksgiving that was
being offered.

Punctually at twenty minutes to eleven on Sunday mornings the fifty-six
pupils and the seven mistresses would leave the great gate of the Villa
Camellia and march into the town, along the esplanade under the grove of
palm trees, then through the beautiful sheltered garden of the Hôtel
Anglais, where many exotic flowers and shrubs were blooming and the
white arum lilies were like an Easter festival, to the doorway, under
the jessamine-covered veranda, that led to the _Eglise anglaise et
américaine_. The school practically made half the congregation, but
there were visitors from the various hotels, and a sprinkling of British
residents who had houses at Fossato. When the service was over there
followed a very pleasant quarter of an hour in the piazza of the hotel;
the clergyman and his wife would speak personally to many of the girls,
and any of the pupils who met friends were allowed to talk to them.
Fossato was a popular week-end resort from Naples, so relatives often
turned up on Sundays and there were many joyous reunions. Kind little
Canon Clark and his small bird-like wife were great favorites at the
Villa Camellia. They were always invited to school functions, and each
term the girls, in relays of about ten at a time, were offered
hospitality at the "Villa Bleue," a tiny dwelling that served as
parsonage for the British chaplain. To go to tea at the dear wee
house--color-washed blue, and with pink geraniums in its
window-boxes--was considered a treat, and Irene and Lorna looked very
glum indeed when Miss Rodgers kept severely to their punishment, and
substituted Agnes and Elsie for themselves in the next contingent of
guests.

"You'll go later on," consoled Peachy. "Miss Rodgers is really very
decent in that way. She'll see that you get your turn once in a term at
any rate. Last time I went we had hot brown scones and molasses. Oh,
they were good! There! I oughtn't to have told you that when your turn's
off. Never mind. It will be something to look forward to. We always play
paper games there, and they're _such_ fun. There I am again! Well, if
you went to-day it would be over and done with by to-morrow, and it's
still all to come. That's one way of taking it."

"Oh, it's all very well to moralize!" grumped Lorna, who was feeling
thoroughly cross. "It's easy enough to count up other people's
blessings. I'm a blighted blossom!"

          "Poor little thing!
           She lived all the winter
           And died in the spring,"

quoted Peachy with an extra wide grin. "Cheer up! Don't you realize
it's only ten days to half-term? Oh, do, for goodness' sake, look less
like a statue of melancholy! Do you know, child, that you're getting
permanent wrinkles along that forehead of yours, and it makes you more
like fifty than fifteen. You're too sedate. That's what's the matter
with you, Lorna Carson! It's a fault that ought to be overcome. Copy
Delia and me. We know how to enjoy ourselves. There--my lecture is over
and now let's talk of earthquakes."

"It's all very well for _you_, you've got everything you want," murmured
Lorna bitterly under her breath. "Some people haven't half the luck, and
it's hard to be content with a short allowance and pretend you're the
same as every one else. It can't always be done."

She turned away as she said it, so Peachy only caught the sound of a
grumble and did not hear the actual words. Had she done so she might
possibly have exhibited more sympathy, for she was a very kind-hearted
girl. Neither she nor anybody at the Villa Camellia understood Lorna in
the least. So far their classmate had been somewhat of a chestnut-bur,
and nobody in the Transition had ever penetrated her husk of reserve.
There is generally a reason for most things in life, if we could only
know it, and poor Lorna's morose and hermit attitude at school was
really the result of matters at home. To get into her innermost
confidence we must follow her to Naples on her half-term holiday and see
for ourselves the peculiar circumstances amid which she had been placed,
and the disadvantages that had caused her to differ from other girls.

Lorna's family was the smallest possible, for it consisted only of her
father. Nobody at the Villa Camellia had ever seen Mr. Carson--not even
Miss Rodgers. He had communicated with her by writing when he wished to
place his daughter at the school, but he had never paid a single visit
to Fossato. He pleaded stress of business as the excuse for this
remissness, but Lorna herself knew only too well that he had no
intention of coming. Except to the office at which he was employed he
never went to any place where he would be likely to meet English
visitors. The furnished rooms where he lived were in the strictly
Italian portion of Naples, and not in the vicinity of the big hotels.
Secretly Lorna dreaded her holidays. There was nothing for her to do
while her father was at the office. She was not allowed to go out alone,
and unless she could induce fat Signora Fiorenza, their landlady, to be
philanthropic and chaperon her to look at the shops, she was obliged to
amuse herself in the house during the day as best she could. In the
evening things were certainly better. Her father would take her to dine
at an Italian restaurant, and would sometimes treat her to a performance
at a theater or cinema close at hand, or would escort her for a
lamplight walk along the streets, but these brief expeditions were
evidently made out of a sense of duty, and Mr. Carson was plainly
unhappy until he was once more ensconced in his own sitting-room with
his favorite books and his reading-lamp. He had seen so little of his
daughter during the five years they had lived at Naples that, though in
a sense he was fond of her, she was more of an embarrassment to him than
an asset. Lorna realized this only too keenly. Her sensitive disposition
shrank away from her father. She was shy in his presence, and never knew
what to say to him. She seemed always aware of some enormous shadow that
hung over their lives and darkened the daylight. What this was she had
no means of guessing, but it was emphatically there. She had learned, by
bitter experience, never to ask to be taken to the fashionable portions
of the city; she knew that the sound of a voice speaking English at a
neighboring table was enough to cause her father to finish his meal in a
hurry and leave the restaurant. They never went to the British Church,
and even such cosmopolitan spots as the aquarium or the museum were
equally taboo.

Long and often did Lorna puzzle over this idiosyncrasy of her father.
She retained vague memories of her early childhood, when he had surely
been utterly different and would come into the nursery to romp with her.
It had not been altogether her mother's death; that had happened when
she was only six years old, and there were bright memories after it of
happy times together. No--it was when she was ten years old that the
unknown catastrophe must have occurred which had ruined her father's
life. She could remember plainly the visit of several gentlemen, and of
loud angry voices talking inside the drawing-room; she was standing on
the stairs as they came out into the hall, and her father had told her
roughly to run away. Then had followed a hasty removal, and they had
left their comfortable home in London and had come to live in Naples.
After a dreary time in a second-rate Italian boarding-house she had been
sent to the Villa Camellia, and all link with England was lost and
broken. No aunt or cousins ever wrote to her, and the earlier portion of
her life seemed a period that was utterly ended.

So far Lorna had never had the courage to make any inquiries into the
why and wherefore of this unsatisfactory state of affairs. If a question
rose to her lips the sight of her father's forbidding face effectually
curbed her curiosity. That some tragedy had been concealed from her she
was positive. The suspicion, nay the absolute certainty, was sufficient
to place a division between herself and other girls. She would hear her
schoolfellows discussing their homes, relations, and friends, and when
she contrasted their gay doings with her own barren holidays she shrank
into her shell, and would make no allusion to her private affairs.

"Lorna's an absolute oyster, you can get nothing out of her," was the
universal verdict of her form.

But if she said little she thought a great deal. She would listen
jealously to the accounts of other people's fun, and a bitter feeling
had grown in her heart. Why should her life be so shadowed? She had as
much right to happiness as the rest of the school. Why should she seem
singled out by a vindictive fate and separated from her companions?

In justice to the girls at the Villa Camellia it is only fair to say
that any separation was entirely of Lorna's own making. Had she been
more expansive she would have readily enough found friends. No one knew
of the misery of her home life, and she was simply judged as what her
schoolfellows thought her--a queer-tempered crank who refused to join in
the general fun of the place, and in consequence was left out of most
things.

Irene, pleasant and hail-fellow-well-met with all comers, had at once
noticed this attitude of the others towards Lorna. At the drawing of
lots in the sorority she had somehow realized that everybody was
extremely thankful to have escaped having her unpopular chum as a buddy.
Chance remarks and slight allusions, hardly noticed at the time, but
remembered later, had confirmed this.

"They're not exactly unkind, but they're down on that girl," she had
concluded. "I haven't made up my mind yet whether I altogether like her,
but I'm going to be decent to her all the same."

As the very first who had treated her on a real equality of girlhood
Irene had been placed on a pedestal in Lorna's empty heart. The
separation between the two added to the loneliness of the latter's brief
half-term holiday. She had never missed school so much before, or hated
her surroundings so entirely. The long week-end dragged itself slowly
away. Sunday was wet and they stayed all day in the little sitting-room,
Mr. Carson reading as usual, and Lorna trying to amuse herself with
Italian magazines and fidgeting as much as she dared. Towards evening
the rain cleared a little and her father went out, refusing, however, to
allow her to accompany him. At the end of an hour he returned and flung
himself heavily into his chair. He was in a state such as she had never
witnessed before, violently excited, with glaring eyes and twitching
hands.

"Lorna!" he exclaimed in quick panting accents, "I have met my enemy.
The man who ruined me! Yes, the man who deliberately blackened and
ruined me!"

Lorna turned to him half frightened.

"What is it, Father?" she asked. "Have you an enemy? You've never let me
know before. Oh, I wish you'd tell me! I'm fifteen now, and surely old
enough to hear. It's so horrible to feel there's something you're always
keeping from me."

"I suppose you'll find out some time, so I may as well tell you myself,"
replied Mr. Carson grimly. "I'm a wronged, ruined man, Lorna, suffering
for the sin of another who goes scotfree. The world judged me guilty of
embezzlement, but before God I am innocent! I never touched a penny of
the money. Do you believe me innocent? Surely my own daughter won't turn
against me?"

"No, no, Father! Indeed I believe you innocent. Tell me how it
happened. Was it when we left London? I seem to remember the trouble
there was then, though you never explained. We had a different name
then, hadn't we?"

"You were too young at the time to understand, and it wasn't a subject I
wished to revive. Briefly, a big sum, for which I was responsible,
disappeared. The head of the firm believed me guilty, but for the sake
of old associations he would not prosecute; he simply told me to go. I
consulted my lawyer, and, if there had been the slightest chance of
clearing myself, I'd have fought the matter to a finish, but he told me
my case hadn't a leg to stand on, and that, if I were foolish enough to
bring it into court, I should certainly be convicted of embezzlement,
and sent to penal servitude; that it was only the clemency of my chief's
attitude that saved me, and that he advised me to go abroad while I
could. So I left England in a hurry, a disgraced man, disowned by his
family and his friends. I changed my name to Carson, and through the
kindness of a business acquaintance I was offered a clerkship in an
Italian counting-house in Naples, which post I have kept ever since. How
I should otherwise have made a living God only knows! It's always my
haunting fear that some one in Naples will recognize me and tell them at
the office who I am. If that old story leaks out I may once more be
ruined."

"But who did it, Father?" asked Lorna. "Had you no clew at all?"

"Not enough to convict, only a strong suspicion, so strong that it is
practically a certainty. The man who ruined me was once my friend. Now
for five long years, he has been my bitterest enemy. We were both heads
of departments in the firm of Burgess and Co. Probably he's a partner
now, as I ought to have been. I've never heard news of him since I left
London, but to-day I saw him in the Corso. I saw him plainly without any
possibility of mistake. What is he doing in Naples? Has he come here to
ruin me again?"

"No, no, Dad, surely not! Perhaps he doesn't know you're in Italy.
Probably he's only taking a holiday and will go back to England soon,"
faltered Lorna, suddenly realizing that in her father's excited nervous
condition she ought to offer consolation and soothe him instead of
adding to his agitation. "It's very unlikely that he would find you out.
Dad, don't grieve so, _please_!"

She went near to her father's chair and laid a timid hand on his
shoulder. An immense gush of pity for him flooded her heart. If she had
known this story before, she would have understood, and instead of
thinking him unkind and misanthropic she would have tried to be a better
daughter to him. The new-found knowledge illuminated all the past and
seemed to draw them closely together.

"_Mother_ would have believed in you, Dad," she ventured to say.

"Thank God she never knew! She was spared that at any rate. I raged
against Providence when I lost her, but afterwards I felt she had been
'taken away from the evil to come.' Her relations thought me guilty. I
went to them and explained, but they practically told me I was lying.
When I went abroad I never sent them my address. I just wished to
vanish. I don't suppose they have ever troubled to inquire for me. Who
cares about a ruined and disgraced man?"

"_I_ care, Dad," said Lorna. "I'm only fifteen and I can't understand
everything, but if you'll let me the least little bit take Mother's
place, may I try? I'm not much, but perhaps I'm better than nobody, and
we two seem all alone in the world."

For the first time in five years the barrier between them was down, and
Lorna was hugging her father as in the old happy childish days. To know
all is to forgive all, and her resentment against his treatment of her
turned into a deep pitying love. She would never be frightened of him
again. A new impulse seemed to have come to her. If she could in any way
comfort him for what he had suffered, it would be something to live for.

"He's my father, and I'll stick to him through thick and thin," she
said to herself fiercely, as she went to bed that night. "I don't know
who this enemy is, but if ever I meet him I'll hate him and all
belonging to him. I say it, and I don't go back on my word. I'll be my
own witness as nobody else is present. Lorna Carson, you've taken up a
feud and you've got to carry it through. May all the bad luck in the
world come down upon you if you break your oath."




CHAPTER VIII

At Pompeii


Lorna returned to Fossato feeling as if she had passed through a great
crisis. The short week-end and its revelation seemed to have added years
to her life. She had never been a typical specimen of "sparkling
girlhood," but her new knowledge made her more sedate than ever. It
brought her both gain and loss: gain in the fact that she now shared her
father's confidence, and could help him to bear his heavy burden, and
loss in the sense of a yet wider division between herself and her
schoolmates. She realized now, only too bitterly, why her father so
persistently shunned all English people. It would surely have been
better to have placed her at an Italian school than among girls of her
own nationality. Lorna, naturally morbid and over-sensitive, shrank yet
deeper into her shell, and became more sphinx-like than ever. Her one
bright spot at the Villa Camellia was her devotion to her buddy. Half a
dozen other girls had at various periods tried to "take Lorna up," but
all had promptly dropped her, declaring that they could not get any
further, and that she was a solitary "hermit-crab." Irene, after one or
two ventures, realized that Lorna was utterly reserved and
uncommunicative, but was content to continue the friendship on a
one-sided basis, giving confidences, but receiving none in return. She
was a little laughed at in certain quarters on the subject of her chum.

"Hope you like crab sauce."

"We're tickled to bits at the pair of you."

"It won't last long."

"Shall we give you an oyster-opener for a birthday present?"

"You've got the champion chestnut-bur of the school--aren't you full of
prickles?"

"Go on!" smiled Irene calmly. "I've been teased all my life by my
brother, so I'm pretty well bomb-proof. Say just what you like. I'm sure
I don't care."

It really did not trouble Irene that Lorna should cling to this habit of
closeness. She had so many affairs of her own in which to be interested.
She had spent a glorious half-term holiday with her family in their flat
at Naples, and was delighted to describe every detail of her
experiences. She chatted about her relations till Lorna knew Mr. and
Mrs. Beverley and Vincent absolutely well by hearsay, though she had
never met them in the flesh. The accounts of their doings gave her a
peep of home life such as she had not hitherto realized.

"Lovely to be you," she ventured once.

"You must come and see us," replied Irene impulsively. "I'll get Mother
to ask you some day. Don't look so scared. They wouldn't eat you. Don't
you like paying visits? Oh well, of course, if you don't want to come I
won't worry you. No, I'm not offended. Why should I be? Let everybody
please herself is my motto. Oh, _don't_ apologize, for it really doesn't
matter in the very least! I'd far rather people were frank and said what
they thought."

"I'm going with you to Pompeii to-morrow at any rate," said Lorna. "I'm
glad they've put us both down together for that excursion."

It was part of the educational scheme of Miss Rodgers and Miss Morley
that the girls should be taken to certain places of interest in the
neighborhood. They were carefully prepared in class beforehand, so that
they should thoroughly understand what they were going to see. All the
school studied Greek and Roman history, and since Christmas there had
been special lectures by Miss Morley on the buried city of Pompeii,
illustrated by lantern-slides. But photography, however excellent, is a
poor substitute for reality when the latter can be obtained. Had the
Villa Camellia been situated in England or America no doubt the pupils
would have considered those views a tremendous asset to their history
class, but being in the near neighborhood of Naples they were able to
"go one better," and have actual expeditions to Pompeii itself. A dozen
of the girls, personally conducted by Miss Morley, were to start on
Thursday, take their lunch, and make a day of it. Most of those chosen
were comparative newcomers to the school, or for some reason had not
done the excursion before, so it would be a fresh experience to nearly
all of them. Six seniors and six members of the Transition made up the
party, with little Désirée Legrand tagged on at the last as a mascot,
because Stella and Carrie had pointed out that twelve pupils and one
mistress would make thirteen at table if they had tea together, and
though Miss Morley had scoffed at such ridiculous superstition, she took
Désirée all the same to break the possible bad luck. They had the
satisfaction of assembling in the hall for the start exactly as their
companions were filing into classrooms.

"Got your nose-bag?" asked Delia, indicating her lunch satchel. "It
wouldn't do to leave those behind. I always feel famished when I'm out
sightseeing. Hope I shan't eat my lunch before the picnic. Renie, it's
no use lugging that camera with you. You won't be allowed to take any
photos inside the ruins, so I warn you."

"Miss Morley's taking hers," objected Irene, loath to relinquish the
object in question.

"Miss Morley has a special government permit to sketch or photo in
Pompeii. Nobody may take the slightest snap-shot or drawing without.
I've been once before, so I know, Madam Doubtful. You'll see ever so
many officials will ask to look at Miss Morley's ticket. Why? Because
the place would get choked up with artists I suppose. And also they want
to sell their own photos. You'll be pestered to buy post-cards outside
the gates."

"I'd adore to get just one or two snaps," persisted Irene. "I won't take
this big camera, but I'll slip my wee one inside my pocket, and see if I
find a chance."

"Are you ready, girls?" came Miss Morley's voice from the porch, and the
waiting thirteen formed into double line and marched.

They were to go by the electric tram from Fossato to Castellamare, from
which it was only a comparatively short drive to Pompeii. The jogging,
jolting, little tramcar ran along the coast, linking up several towns
and villages and conveying people intent on either business or pleasure.
There were many visitors anxious to make the excursion to-day, but the
contingent from the Villa Camellia had posted themselves by the statue
of Garibaldi in the square, and scrambled for the car as soon as it
arrived, boarding it with three hatless Italian girls, two women with
orange baskets, a sailor carrying a little boy, and a stout old padre,
who apologized prettily for pushing.

"We did those folks from the Hotel Royal," chuckled Delia, sitting on
Irene's knee for lack of further accommodation. "Did you ever see a tram
fill up quicker? I'm afraid I'm heavy. I know I'm an awful lump. We'll
take it in turns, and I'll nurse you after a while. I call this rather
priceless. Everybody's good-tempered even if they do hustle. They don't
seem to mind people treading on their toes. It's infectious. I catch
myself smiling, and I'd jolly well frown as a rule if any one yanked a
basket into my back."

"I think it's the climate," remarked Irene. "In a London tram most faces
don't look too cheerful, but with this sky overhead people are simply
chirping like crickets. It's like a perpetual summer holiday."

The car was rattling along the steep coast road through miles of
glorious scenery. On the left was an ultramarine sea, with white-sailed
boats, and to the right lay cliffs and olive groves. Some of the trees
were covered with catkins, and others had already burst into green leaf;
gorgeous yellow genistas clothed the hillsides, and the banks were
dappled with blue borage and marigolds. There were so many things to
look at from either window of the tram; goats were feeding along the
crags, and a gray businesslike battle-ship was wending its way across
the harbor in the direction of Naples. They passed through several small
towns or villages, getting a vivid impression of the lives of the
inhabitants, who, on sunny days, seemed to do much of their domestic
work out of doors, and to peel potatoes, wash salads, cook on charcoal
braziers, sew, mend shoes, make lace, and pursue many other vocations on
the pavements in front of the houses, and so far from being disturbed by
onlookers, would smile and even wave friendly hands at the strangers on
the tramcar.

"That darling old soul in the green apron blew me a kiss," chuckled
Delia. "She looks as happy as a queen, though she's probably living on
about ten cents a day."

"Did you see them dressing the baby on the pavement?" squealed Stella.
"They were winding it round and round in yards of bandages _exactly_
like old Italian pictures. I didn't know it was done nowadays."

"Oh! Look at the carts drawn by bullocks."

"And the lamb with its fleece all combed out and tied with blue
ribbons."

"That's because it's Mid-Lent."

"Don't you see the baby donkey? There! Quick!"

In her efforts to watch everything at once Delia craned her neck through
the window of the car and away went her school hat, sailing over a
bridge and down into a deep ravine below, lost forever so far as she was
concerned, as the tram certainly would not stop and wait while she
searched for it.

"You've come down a peg in life, old sport, that's all," laughed
Carrie. "In Italy wearing a hat is a sign of gentility. No work-girl
ever has one on her head even on Sundays. I offered a cast-off of mine
to the _bonne_ at a hotel once, and she eyed it longingly, but said she
daren't wear it if she took it, her friends would think it such swank."

"What do they have on in church then?" asked Delia.

"Handkerchiefs, of course. Every Neapolitan has one handy to slip round
her head at the church door. It must save millinery bills."

"And they all have the most beautiful hair. Hello! Here we are at the
terminus. What a crowd of beggars. They look like brigands waiting to
pounce on us. Help!"

Once out of the shelter of the tramcar the girls made the unpleasant
discovery that in Italy begging is not forbidden, but quite a recognized
profession with certain of the poorer classes. They were immediately
surrounded by a ragged rabble, some of whom exhibited sores or other
unsightly afflictions to compel compassion, and all of whom held out
dirty hands and persistently clamored for money. The blind, the halt,
and the maimed were there, evidently regarding tourists as their
legitimate prey, and bent upon claiming all the charity they could get.

"Don't give them anything," commanded Miss Morley, anxiously keeping her
little flock in tow, and shepherding them towards the piazza where the
carriages could be hired. "Just say _Niente_, and shake your heads. Hold
a safe hand on your purses and stick together. Don't get separated on
any account."

With considerable difficulty they forced their way across the square,
and thankfully took refuge in several waiting landaus, whose drivers,
feeling sure of their patronage, promptly raised their terms high above
the ordinary tariff. It was only after much bargaining on the part of
Miss Morley that they consented to fix a reasonable sum for the
excursion to Pompeii.

"Miss Morley talks Italian like a native, so they can't 'do' her,"
rejoiced Stella proudly. "Aren't they the absolute limit? No, I _don't_
want to buy a comb, or corals, or brooches, or post-cards, or anything.
They seem to think we're made of money. Why can't they let us alone?
There, thank goodness, we're off at last and can leave the whole
persuasive crew of them behind us!"

The five-mile drive from Castellamare was part of the fun of the
excursion, but Pompeii was, of course, the main object, and there was
much excitement when they at last drew up at the great iron gate. Miss
Morley bought tickets for the party, and they were assigned a guide, a
smiling Italian of superlative politeness, bearing a badge with the
number 24 upon it.

"I asked for one who could speak English, but they're all out with other
visitors," explained Miss Morley. "Never mind. It's a good opportunity
of testing your Italian, and I can interpret if you don't understand."

In spite of the lantern-slides which they had previously been shown,
the girls had come with varying expectations of what they were to see.
Some imagined they would walk into a Roman city exactly as it stood when
buried by the ashes of the great eruption of A.D. 79; others thought
there would be a few interesting things peeping up here and there amid
mounds of cinders. None had imagined it would be so large.

As a matter of fact the remains are simply the bare ruins of a town
destroyed by burning ashes, which have been extricated from the rubbish
accumulated during more than seventeen centuries. The paved streets and
the roofless and broken walls of the houses still remain, with here and
there some building that by a fortunate chance escaped, either in whole
or in part, the general catastrophe, and suffice to show the general
style and beauty of the Græco-Roman architecture of the first century.
The guide marshaled his party along, pointing out to them the various
objects of interest that had been excavated, the beautiful marble
drinking-fountain, the marble counters of the shops, identical with
those still used in Southern Italy, the wine jars of red earthenware,
the hand-mills for grinding corn, the brick ovens, or the vaults where
wine had been stored. They went into the site of the ancient market, and
the Forum and several temples, and walked up long flights of steps and
admired rows of broken columns, and saw the public swimming-baths with
their tasteful wall decorations and the niches where the bathers had
placed their clothes, and they admired the law-courts, and marveled at
the great theater that had been wont to hold five thousand spectators.

The general impression was one of utter desolation. The mighty ruins lay
in the bright Italian sunshine, and, close above, Vesuvius frowned over
the scene, as if still watching the result of his deadly handiwork. Who
had lived in those blackened fire-swept houses, and walked in those
grass-grown streets? It was difficult to imagine the busy thronging
crowds that once must have peopled all these silent haunts, where the
only signs of life were the little green lizards that darted over the
crumbling walls.

Certain of the best houses were railed round and kept carefully locked,
and inside these could be seen what was left of the domestic life of
civilized Pompeii. The girls enjoyed looking at the rooms in the Casa
Dei Vettii, with the exquisite paintings of cupids still left upon the
scarlet walls, they laughed at the quaint mosaic of the chained dog with
its warning _Cave Canem_ (Beware of the dog!), and they went into
ecstasies over the lovely little statue of the Dancing Faun and some
terracottas of Venus and Mercury. One link with the past was left in the
fact that a few of the houses still preserved the names and even the
portrait-busts of their former owners.

"My! Doesn't he look boss of the place still? I wonder if I ought to
leave my visiting card for him," declared Delia, staring at the green
marble representation of Cecilius Giscondis, a banker by profession.

The others laughed. They had all been feeling rather oppressed, and were
glad to break the ice.

"I'm so tired, I should think we must have walked miles," groaned Lorna.

"And I'm on the point of famishing," protested Irene, slapping her
lunch-bag with a resounding smack.

Miss Morley turned round at the sound, and possibly caught the remark,
for she spoke hastily to the guide, then suggested that the girls should
sit in a row on a fallen column and consume their provisions.

"You all need a rest and something to eat now. Then we'll go on with our
sightseeing, and have tea at the restaurant when we've finished," she
decreed.

Never were ham sandwiches and oranges so acceptable. Viewing ruins may
be extremely interesting, but it is a highly fatiguing occupation, and
Delia at least had reached the stage of the over-burdened camel.

"I guess I don't like anything B.C. It's too depressing. Give me Paris!"
she declared tragically.

"Cheer up, old sport!" consoled Irene. "I'm going to take a snap-shot
of some of us when the guide isn't looking. You shall be in it. You'd
like to send some prints to your friends in America, wouldn't you?"

"Rather! They'd burst with envy to see me photographed inside Pompeii.
Where are you going to take us? I've finished my lunch. Let's get busy
quick, before the guide comes round the corner."

Delia was prancing with eagerness. She flitted about like a butterfly,
bent on choosing the best position for the desired snap-shot. Blanche,
Mabel, and Elsie came hurrying up anxious to join the group, and fixed
themselves in elegant poses.

"Oh, I can't put in such a crowd," objected Irene. "You block out the
whole of the view. I only want Delia and Lorna, and yes, I'll have
Désirée, but nobody else. Please clear out of the way."

"Well, really!"

"You mean thing!"

"We don't want to be in your old photo!"

Irene had felt cross and was possibly impolite, but she was not prepared
for the Nemesis that descended upon her head. She had just congratulated
herself that Blanche, Mabel, and Elsie had beaten a retreat and that she
had been able to take her snap-shot so successfully, when who should
make his unwelcome appearance but the guide, catching her in the very
act of winding on her film. He sighed sorrowfully, and spread out his
hands with a dramatic Italian gesture.

"Signorina! Non e permesso!" he objected.

[Illustration: "'SIGNORINA! IT IS NOT PERMITTED!'"

--Page 105]

"I'm awfully sorry. I won't do it again, really," murmured Irene,
cramming the little camera back into her pocket.

But this apology did not content No. 24. He very courteously, but quite
firmly, insisted upon temporarily confiscating the prohibited article.
Miss Morley, who hurried up at the sound of the altercation, took the
side of the authorities.

"Who brought a camera? _Irene!_ You knew it was not allowed. Yes, you
must let the guide have it. He'll give it back to you at the gate. I
hope there won't be any trouble about it. I believe you can be fined. It
was very naughty of you to do such a thing."

Much crestfallen Irene retired into the rear of the party, and bewailed
the fate of her snap-shots.

"It was hard luck the guide should pop round the corner that exact
minute," she groaned.

"Mabel fetched him," squeaked Désirée. "I could see over the railing,
and I watched her go. She was mad that you wouldn't put her in the
photo."

"What a sneaking trick to play. She's the _meanest_ girl. I wouldn't
have told about _her_. I hope No. 24 won't take the spool out of the
camera, because there are three undeveloped snaps of the Villa Camellia
on it, and I shall be wild if I lose them. He couldn't be so heartless.
If I only knew Italian better I'd try and coax him."

The guide had obligingly waited while the girls ate lunch, but he now
waxed impatient, and hurried his party on to the House of Pansa. This
must have been quite a palatial residence, and showed such perfect
examples of the arrangement of the various rooms in a Roman mansion that
they lingered a long time looking at the _atrium_, the _tablinum_, the
peristyle, and the kitchen with its curious mosaics of snakes. Now,
though it was all very interesting, it was certainly tiring, and some of
the girls grew weary of listening to the guide's descriptions in Italian
or Miss Morley's explanations.

"I'm bored stiff," confessed Delia, in a whisper, linking on to Irene's
arm. "If I have any more information crammed into my head it will burst.
I know quite enough about ancient customs already. All I can say is I'm
thankful I'm living now instead of then. Renie, if you love me, take me
out of ear-shot of Miss Morley and let me chatter and frivol."

"Poor old sport!" laughed Irene. "Let's slip away and take another turn
round the garden while the guide finishes haranguing. I'm out of friends
with him since he stole my camera. He doesn't deserve anybody to listen
to him. I've a few chocs left in this package. You shall have some to
cheer you up. They're modern at any rate."

"You mascot!" murmured Delia. "Stella says I'm a Goth, but why _need_ I
like old things? Did the Pompeians take their schoolgirls to look at
buried Greek cities, or were they satisfied with their own times? How
soon do you think we shall have tea? These chocs have saved my life, but
I'm longing for bread and butter and buns."

"Why, we haven't finished lunch very long."

"I ate more than half of mine in the carriage, so I hadn't much left.
Hello! Where have the others been? I didn't know there was a way up
there."

The rest of the party were clattering down a flight of wooden steps with
many expressions of admiration for what they had seen at the top.

"Perfectly beautiful! The finest view of all," purred Miss Morley.
"Renie and Delia, didn't you go up? You silly girls. You've missed a
treat. No, I'm afraid we can't wait now. The guide is anxious to take us
on. We haven't seen the House of Sallust yet or the Street of Tombs. I
want to ask him whether they've been doing any more excavations near the
Herculaneum Gate."

Miss Morley, deep in conversation with No. 24, passed on, in the full
belief that all her flock were following behind her. Irene and Delia,
however, were determined to have just one peep at the view from the top
of the wall, so both made a dash up the wooden staircase. From here
there was a glorious prospect of the entire city with its arches and
columns and broken temples, its cypress trees, and its somber background
of smoking mountain. They could see exactly the way they had come from
the entrance, and could tell which was the Street of Fortune and which
the Street of Abundance. It was so fascinating that they lingered rather
longer than they intended.

"They'll be waiting for us," ventured Irene at last.

"Oh, bother! So they will," exclaimed Delia, rushing down prepared for a
scolding.

But the others had not waited. They had all simply walked on, and the
custodian had locked the gate behind them. It was fast closed, and no
amount of shaking would move it.

"We're shut in," gasped Irene. "Where's the porter? He ought to be
somewhere about with the key."

The custodian, quite oblivious of the fact that anybody had been left
inside the House of Pansa, was reading a newspaper and eating bread and
garlic under his wooden shed farther down the street, where he would
remain till the next guide came along with a party and requested
admission. So he did not hear, though the girls thumped and called and
made a very considerable noise. They were both horribly frightened.

"Shall we have to stay here all night?"

"I'd be scared to death."

"Think of the spooks!"

"Why the whole place must be simply _chock-full_ of ghosts after
sunset."

"Couldn't we jump from the wall?"

"I wish I'd never come. Oh, I hate things B.C.! I shall have fits in a
minute."

Fortunately for Delia's nerves they were not kept long in durance vile.
Lorna very soon discovered the loss of her buddy, drew Miss Morley's
attention to the matter, and the whole party hastened back to look for
them. The custodian was fetched from his wooden shelter and unlocked the
door, loudly disclaiming any responsibility on his part, and blaming the
guide.

"It's your own fault," scolded Miss Morley. "You really _must_ keep with
the party. I can't have any of you wandering off alone. You can't expect
me to count you every time we come out of a building. I put you on your
parole not to get separated again."

"We won't indeed, _indeed_! We don't like being lost," promised the
delinquents earnestly.

Everybody, including the Principal, was very tired by this time, and not
altogether sorry when the guide finished his tour of the ruins, and
conducted them safely back again to the entrance.

"It's glorious, but you want days to see it in, instead of only a few
hours," sighed Phyllis.

"And cast-iron backs and legs," agreed Sybil. "I shall enjoy thinking it
over when I'm home, but I'm ready to drop at the present moment."

"What about my camera?" asked Irene anxiously.

The guide had not forgotten it; he produced it from his pocket,
and--perhaps in consideration of the tip he had received from Miss
Morley--he did not confiscate the spool, but handed it over intact with
a polite gesture and a cryptic smile.

"Grazie molto--_molto_!" murmured Irene, which meant "Thanks awfully,"
and was one of the very few Italian phrases which she knew.

Everybody was extremely glad to adjourn to the restaurant, where tea had
been ordered for their party, and a table reserved for them. The big
room was full of visitors and rather noisy; a band of musicians in the
center rendered Neapolitan songs to an accompaniment of mandolins and
guitars, and occasionally the audience joined the choruses. The
performance was not of the highest quality, but it was tuneful and
interesting to those who had not before heard the folk-songs of Southern
Italy. After tea the girls made a rush to buy post-cards and other
mementoes of Pompeii, which were on sale in a room next to the
restaurant, and would have spent half an hour over their purchases had
not Miss Morley collected her flock and insisted on a homeward start.
Poor little Désirée slept all the way back in the tramcar, with her head
on Stella's shoulder, and most of the party were in much more sober
spirits than when they had started. All felt, however, that it was a
never-to-be-forgotten experience.

"I'd adore to go again sometime," ventured Lorna, clasping a model of a
Pompeian lamp, which her chum had given her for a souvenir.

"So would I," agreed Irene. "Miss Morley calls this 'part of our
education,' and I think it's a very sensible way of teaching things. I
hope she'll take us to other places."

"You'll get Vesuvius if your conduct sheet is all right."

"Oh, lovely! I'd rather go there than even to Pompeii."

"The same this child," chipped in Delia. "Renie, I guess you and I will
have to shake ourselves up and reform for a week or two. We were in Miss
Morley's black book to-day, and if we don't take care we shall be left
out of the next excursion."

"I'll be an absolute saint," promised Irene. "You'll see me sprouting
wings. I'm going to draw a physical map of the world and mark in all the
principal volcanoes, and then show it to Miss Morley. She'll think it so
brainy of me and be so glad I'm interested in the subject. She'd really
feel I ought to see Vesuvius after that."

"You schemer! It's not a bad idea though, and perhaps I'll do the same,
though I hate drawing maps. Hello! Is this the piazza? I'd no idea we'd
got back to Fossato so soon. Yes, it's been a 'happy day,' but I feel
all I want now is supper and bed."




CHAPTER IX

Reprisals


It was immediately after this that Peachy, who was always doing
imprudent things and running risks, went a little too far and caught a
severe chill. She was moved into the sanatorium, a room at the top of
the house, and spent three quite happy days in bed, reading books and
magazines, and drinking hot lemonade, which was Miss Rodgers' favorite
remedy for a cold. When she was certified as free from any infection, a
few of her special chums were allowed to visit her. She petitioned
specially for Jess, Delia, and Irene. They found her propped up with
pillows, and looking very charming in a pale pink dressing-jacket and
her hair tied back with a broad ribbon.

"Thanks very much. I'm sitting up and taking nourishment," she grinned,
in reply to their commiserations. "I'm going to have some more fun
before I pop off! Joking apart, I've had the time of my life here. It's
been blissful just reading and resting, with a big jug of lemonade at my
elbow."

"We've been talking about you downstairs. Didn't your ears burn?" asked
Jess.

"Not more than usual. What were you saying about poor little me?"

"We had a special meeting of the Camellia Buds, and passed a vote of
sympathy, for one thing. I suppose I ought to 'convey' it to you in the
orthodox fashion."

"Highly gratified, I'm sure," chirped Peachy. "How do I return thanks,
please? I can't get up in bed and bow. What next?"

"Well, the next is that nobody can think of anything original for the
Transition to do at the carnival, and everybody said 'Ask Peachy,' so
we've come to you for a suggestion."

"Whew! That's a big order," groaned the invalid. "We've had almost every
kind of stunt that's practically possible. What are the seniors getting
up this time?"

"Something musical, to judge from the practicing we hear. It sounds like
operetta. And the juniors are having a fairy play. Miss Morgan is
teaching them. What we want is something utterly and entirely
different."

"Exactly!" agreed Peachy, taking a drink of lemonade.

"If you don't have a brain-throb we shall have to descend to an ordinary
concert."

"Or a scene from Shakespeare."

"Or a _tableau vivant_."

"And those have been done simply dozens of times."

"I know," frowned Peachy. "We had 'The Trial Scene' from _The Merchant
of Venice_ ourselves last carnival. We couldn't give the same stunt
again. Oh, don't bother me! Let me think. How can I get ideas when
you're all talking at once?"

Peachy put her fingers in her ears and buried her head temporarily in
the pillow, from which she appeared to draw inspiration, for in a few
moments she sprang up with a bounce of rapture.

"Got it!" she announced cheerily. "Let's do a toy-shop. You shall all be
dressed up as toy animals and be wound up to work. Oh, I see ever such
possibilities. The seniors never had _that_ at any rate."

"Good!"

"It sounds prime!"

"What a mascot you are."

"Don't breathe a word outside the form," warned Peachy. "I'll plan it
all out and we'll have a rehearsal when I'm downstairs again. I guess
we'll give them a surprise. Hand me my writing-pad, somebody, and a
pencil. I want to get busy sketching costumes. I can see the whole thing
in my mind's eye and it ought to be great."

Every year in the month of March the pupils at the Villa Camellia
celebrated a carnival of their own. It coincided with a local festival
at Fossato, on which occasion the inhabitants were wont to make merry,
dressing themselves in fantastic costumes, parading the streets, and
letting off fireworks. Originally the girls had been taken to see the
gay doings, but the town was often so rough that Miss Rodgers had
decided it was an unsuitable entertainment for young ladies, and, to
prevent disappointment, made the happy suggestion that they should keep
the festival in their own grounds. So each spring the three divisions of
the school vied with one another in producing some fresh surprise, and
had a very interesting and amusing afternoon in the garden or gymnasium,
and were too busily occupied to feel any regret at being deprived of the
sight of what was going on in Fossato.

Canon and Mrs. Clark and a few of Miss Rodgers' and Miss Morley's
friends, who lived in the neighborhood, were generally invited to swell
the audience of teachers. The juniors were given a little assistance by
their form mistresses, but the seniors and the Transition managed their
own affairs. Now it was a most unfortunate circumstance that at present
the two sororities in the Transition were in direct opposition. Each
was, of course, aware of the other's existence, but each society kept
its own secrets. The Camellia Buds did not even know the name of their
rival, though they could guess at its list of members. Peachy, recovered
from her cold, came downstairs bubbling over with plans for a due
celebration of the festival. She submitted them gleefully to the
assembled girls, after French class. Much to her surprise about half of
the form demurred.

"We're going to do something of our own," announced Bertha airily. "We
don't want your stunt."

"Of our own? What d'you mean?" asked Peachy, her gray eyes snapping.

"I mean what I say. Some of us have arranged a little private
performance--we're going to keep it to ourselves."

"And leave out the rest of us?"

"You can have one of your own."

"Well, I like that!" flamed Peachy. "You're dividing the form into two
stunts. We've never done that before. Besides, who sent up a message
asking me to think of something fresh and original? I certainly
understood it was from _all_ of you."

Peachy, in huge indignation, glared into several conscious and guilty
faces, while her allies backed up her arguments by cries of "Shame!"
Bertha turned rather red but bluffed the matter out.

"We changed our minds. We can't always do everything all in a lump. As I
said before, we've got our own stunt, and you Camellia Buds can have
yours."

Camellia Buds! If Bertha had dropped a bomb in the classroom she could
not have caused greater consternation among the opposition. So the rival
society knew the name of their sorority. A suppressed "O-o-h!" arose
here and there. Evidently much enjoying their confusion Bertha and her
confederates retired, leaving the poor Camellia Buds to hold an
indignation meeting. Everybody talked at once.

"How did they find out?"

"Has anybody sneaked?"

"It's the absolute limit!"

"I couldn't have believed it!"

"It gives me spasms!"

"Of all mean things!"

"It makes me tingle!"

Then Jess, who was practical, made a suggestion.

"I vote we take an oath of every member that she hasn't betrayed us."

"'O wise young judge!'" quoted Agnes. "That's the best thing anybody's
said yet. Let's stand round in a row and swear 'Honest Injun.'"

If the Camellia Buds sustained doubts of one another's integrity these
were absolutely dispelled by the fervency with which each pleaded her
innocence.

"Somebody must have been eavesdropping at one of our meetings, I
suppose," sighed Agnes gloomily. "It's horrid to think they know our
secrets and we don't know theirs. I'd give worlds to get even."

"Where do they meet?" asked Delia. "I've never been able to find out."

"They're very clever in hiding themselves."

"Yes, I expect they keep watch, and scoot whenever they see one of us."

"That's it, of course," said Irene. "Well, what we've got to do is to
catch them off their guard. I vote we get the kids to help us. They
detest Bertha and Mabel. They'd just adore to track them for us. We
needn't exactly tell them why."

"Good for you, Renie Beverley. Those kids will do a turn for their
fairy godmothers. We'll call another candy party and put them on the
scout. I've a box of peppermint creams that will just go round. One
apiece ought to be enough for them to-day."

The juniors were fond of peppermints, and even a limited candy party was
in their opinion better than none at all. They had never received sweets
of any description from Bertha or Mabel; indeed they regarded them as
arch-enemies. The idea of keeping a watch over their movements appealed
to them.

"We'll shadow them, you bet!" grinned little Jean Hammond. "There isn't
much going on in the school that we don't know."

"I'm afraid there isn't. You're rather imps. But you'll be doing a good
deed if you find this out for us. The first who brings news shall have
two chocolates."

The Camellia Buds felt no more compunction in employing the juniors on
this quest than a government that organizes a secret service department.
The enemy had betrayed them shamelessly and deserved reprisals. It was
Désirée after all who won the chocolates. She haunted house and garden
with the persistency of a small ghost, and at last proudly made the
announcement:

"They've called a meeting by the big Greek jar to-day at five. I heard
Ruth tell Callie. What are you going to do about it?"

That was exactly the question which puzzled the Camellia Buds. It was
one thing to obtain information and quite another to act upon it. If
they went and interrupted the rival meeting they would have the
satisfaction of routing the enemy but would be none the wiser. It was
Peachy's diplomacy that pointed out a way.

"The Greek vase!" she said meditatively. "Yes, it's enormously big and I
think I can manage it. Now, my dearies, don't you want to be real
philanthropic this afternoon and give up your turns at the tennis courts
to other folks? Why? Because I've a little scheme on hand. I want to
keep those girls well away from the lemon pergola until it's time for
their precious meeting. Then they'll run up all unsuspecting, poor
innocents, and find----"

"What will they find?"

"'A chiel amang them takin' notes!'" chuckled Peachy. "In other words
yours truly will be hiding inside the big jar."

"Peachy! You can't!"

"Can't I? Great Scott! Do you think I'm going to let this beat me? You
can just bet your last nickel I shall. Renie and Jess shall help to hide
me, and the rest of you must watch the coast's clear till I'm safely
inside. I tell you I'm crazy to try it. It'll be the frolic of my life."

There was certainly no plan too madcap for Peachy to undertake. She
revelled in anything venturesome or bizarre. The Camellia Buds did as
she decreed, and resigned the courts that afternoon to Bertha, Mabel,
Elsie, Ruth, Rosamonde, Winnie, Monica, and Callie, who fell readily
into the trap prepared for them. Leaving this double set busy at tennis
they fled to the opposite end of the garden.

The lemon pergola was a sheltered walk that led down a flight of marble
steps to a small fountain. There was a shady nook here with bushes of
bamboo, and a tree with a sweet flower like honeysuckle, and little red
roses, and a border of Parma violets, and a seat made of bright green
tiles--altogether a very retired and pleasant and suitable spot in which
to hold a committee meeting. Exactly behind the seat stood an enormous
jar of terra-cotta, colored red, and decorated with Greek figures in
black silhouette, rather blurred and rubbed off, but still
distinguishable. No doubt its original use had been to store water,
wine, or olive-oil, but nowadays it was merely an ornament to the
garden. A plant pot full of scarlet geraniums rested on its head, and an
arbutula twined up the sides.

Peachy climbed up the bank behind, and with the help of Jess removed
the pot of scarlet geraniums; then very cautiously and carefully she let
herself down inside the jar. It was just big enough to contain her, and
she lay concealed like one of the forty thieves in the story of _Ali
Baba_. She had one advantage, however, over the famous brigands. There
was a little round hole broken in the front of the jar, and by putting
her eye to this she had an excellent view of her surroundings.

"Are you all right?" asked Irene anxiously.

"Fixed splendidly, thanks. Stick that flower-pot back on the top and
nobody'll ever guess I'm inside. Now scoot, quick, for it won't do for
them to see you haunting round. The place must look absolutely innocent
when they arrive."

"We won't go too far. Shout for us if you get so you can't bear it any
longer," said Jess, putting the geraniums on like a stopper, and
dragging Irene away.

Peachy's position was certainly not one of comfort, squatting at the
bottom of the great jar, and she was relieved that she had not long to
wait before the rival sorority arrived to hold its meeting. The girls
came scurrying, flushed after their games of tennis, and flung
themselves down, some on the marble steps and some on the tiled seat.
Bertha, as the Camellia Buds had suspected, was evidently the high
priestess, and opened the ceremony without delay.

"Members of the Starry Circle," she began hurriedly, "repeat your oath."

"We vow to be loyal to one another and to our President, and never to
reveal the secrets of our society," recited seven voices in reply.

("Aha!" chuckled Peachy to herself, in the depths of the gigantic jar.
"Got the name of your precious sorority slap-bang off!")

"We've met together this afternoon," continued Bertha, "to settle
finally what parts we're going to take at the carnival. Ruth, just look
round, please, and be _sure_ none of those wretched Camellia Buds is
anywhere about."

Bertha paused, while Ruth made a tour among the bushes, and seemed
slightly puzzled when the latter reported:

"Coast clear."

"It's a funny thing," commented the President, "but I declare I can
smell that particular strong lily-of-the-valley scent that Peachy is so
fond of. I suppose it's only fancy?"

"I can smell it too," confirmed Elsie, sniffing the air.

"Are there any lilies-of-the-valley out anywhere near?" asked Mabel.

"No, it's too early for them."

"Then somebody else must have the same scent, or have picked up Peachy's
_mouchoir_ by mistake."

A general examination of handkerchiefs followed, but each girl
disclaimed all responsibility for the delicate odor.

"Queer! I can't understand it. However, let's get to business. Our
waxworks are absolutely going to take the shine out of their stupid old
toy-shop. The only trouble is how we're going to get hold of the right
costumes. There's Queen Elizabeth now--I can manage her skirt, but I
want something for her farthingale. What can we raise?"

"Peachy has a lovely flowered silk dressing-gown," remarked Mabel. "It
would be just the thing."

"Suppose she uses it herself though."

"I won't give her a chance. I'll take it out of her cubicle the night
before and hide it."

"O-o-h! You will! Will you?" exploded a voice from the interior of the
Greek jar. "We'll just see about that."

The fact was that Peachy's crouching position had grown intolerable. She
was bound to move and reveal herself, and her indignation at Mabel's
cool suggestion flamed forth through the peep-hole.

The Circle sprang up in much alarm, and some of them squealed as the pot
of geraniums fell with a crash from the top of the big jar, and Peachy's
pink face and fluffy hair appeared instead. Her flashing gray eyes
certainly held no love light in them.

"You mean things!" raged Peachy. "Call yourselves stars, do you? I can't
see anything very star-like about you. Have your old waxworks if you
like, but I can tell you beforehand you won't take the shine out of
_us_. You've copied my idea shamelessly, and if you're going to steal
our properties too--yes, you may well scoot. Don't ever dare to show
your faces to me again."

For the members of the Starry Circle had broken up their meeting, and
were running away down the lemon pergola in the direction of the house,
immensely upset to find there had been a secret listener in their midst.
Once they were out of sight Peachy cooeed for Jess and Irene, who
appeared bursting with laughter and demanding details, having witnessed
the rout of the enemy from a distance.

"I'll tell you presently if you'll help me climb out of this wretched
thing," said Peachy, who found it a far more difficult matter to
extricate herself from the jar than it had been to drop into it. "How'm
I going to manage? Oh, don't pull my arms so, you hurt!"

It was indeed somewhat of a problem, and Peachy was beginning to feel
seriously alarmed, when, fortunately, one of the gardeners came to the
rescue, and tilted the jar over so as to allow her to crawl out.

"I feel like a released Slave of the Lamp, or a freed dryad, or
something fairy-taley or mythological," she declared. "It was worth it,
though, to see those girls' faces. Thank you, Giovanni! I'm ever so much
obliged. Sorry if I've spoilt your bed of violets. Is that Delia calling
us? Coming, dearie. Where are the rest of the Camellia Buds? I may as
well tell my story to the whole bunch of you together. Then you'll see
the sort of thing we're up against. They've taken our idea, and they're
trying to beat us on our own ground. That's what it's all about."




CHAPTER X

The School Carnival


The Camellia Buds considered that they possessed a real grievance. The
difference between an animated toy-shop and waxworks was so slight as to
be immaterial. In both the figures would require to be wound up, after
which they would perform various antics. The idea had certainly
originated with Peachy, and the Starry Circle had merely copied it.
Their stunt was in fact a shameless plagiarism.

"Why couldn't they have joined with us and we'd have done the toy-shop
all together?" demanded Agnes crossly.

"Oh, I don't know. It's just their perversity. It'll look so stupid to
have two separate shows. Whichever comes last will seem so stale after
the other."

"Why, of course, ours will come first! It _must_!"

"There'll be a fight for it."

"We can't squabble at the carnival with Miss Rodgers and Miss Morley
looking on. We'd better have our battle beforehand and get it over."

"Tell the Stars we mean to have first innings?"

"They'll never agree!"

"Look here, it's no use coming to open war with them. I vote we try
diplomacy. Has anybody thought of the programs yet?"

"I heard the seniors groaning over having to paint covers for them."

"Well, let's go to them privately and volunteer to help. Then we shall
have the opportunity of telling them that the Transition stunt is to be
in two divisions, and that Part I will be taken by ourselves."

"Quite a brain-throb!"

"Renie, I'm beginning to admire you!"

"Peachy can paint beautifully!"

"So can Joan and Esther. Shall I go and say we offer to do six programs?
Right-o! Come with me, Peachy. You're our champion wheedler."

The two delegates started at once on their diplomatic mission. They
felt indeed that there was no time to be lost. They found several of the
prefects collected in Rachel's bedroom, where possibly they were having
a little private candy party, for there were sounds of a rustling of
paper and a shutting of drawers before they were granted permission to
enter the precincts. The Transition girls always envied the seniors'
rooms. These were on the seaward side of the house, and their balcony
had glorious views over the bay and the surrounding coast. The
decorations were very tasteful. The walls were gray, with a stenciled
frieze of hydrangeas, and there were soft-shaded Indian rugs on the
polished wood floor. Rachel and her roommates had provided their own
luxuries in the way of pretty cushions, table-covers, pictures, and
flower-vases, and the general effect was of harmonious comfort.

"Well? What can I do for you?" inquired the head girl briefly, as Stella
admitted the diplomats.

It was not a very encouraging reception. Possibly the prefects were
annoyed at being disturbed in the midst of what they were doing.

Peachy, however, ignored Rachel's tone, and putting on her most winning
smile inquired:

"We wonder if you're painting any program covers for the carnival?"

Rachel lolled back in her chair and retied the bow that terminated her
long dark pigtail.

"Perhaps we are and perhaps we aren't," was her somewhat cryptic reply.

"The matter's in our hands entirely, of course," cooed Sybil, rocking to
and fro on a cane _sedia_.

"I know," put in Irene, trying to be tactful. "We only thought that
perhaps you might care to have a little help. Some of us would be ready
to paint a few if you like."

This put a different complexion on the case. The seniors, always
bristling for their privileges, resented idle curiosity--on the part of
the Transition. But an offer of help was another matter.

"There certainly is a great number to be done," said Erica, with a
beseeching look at Rachel.

The head girl thawed a little.

"Well, we shouldn't mind your taking a few off our hands," she conceded.
"Half a dozen? Sybil, will you get those programs out of my drawer? Put
anything you like on them--flowers, birds, figures, or landscapes. I'll
lend you this to copy the printing from. Let me have them by Thursday if
you can."

Rachel glanced meaningly at the door, as if she considered the interview
might now with decency come to an end. Neither Peachy nor Irene took the
hint, however. The main object of their mission had not yet been
broached.

"You've not written the program inside yet," commented Peachy, opening
one of the covers.

"We'll do that later."

"Shall we copy some for you?"

"Oh, no, thanks!"

Then Irene, growing desperate, blurted out what they had really come to
say.

"The Transition stunt is to be in two parts this time. Bertha and Mabel
are arranging one, and Peachy is getting up another. Do you mind putting
ours down to come first?"

"Sorry, but I'm afraid it can't be done," yawned Rachel. "Bertha has
been up and bagged first innings. I wrote it down, didn't I, Stella?
Where's that list? Yes, here we are. The juniors are to come first,
because Miss Morgan has trained them and she thinks they'll get the
fidgets if they wait, and it's better to have their performance over.
Then, of course, comes our stunt, and then the Transition."

"Could we possibly have our half of the Transition stunt before yours?
It would make more variety."

"Most certainly not!"

Rachel's brow was puckered in a frown, and Sybil, from the depths of the
rocking-chair, murmured, "Cheek!"

"We've got the program all fixed up, and we're not going to change it
for anybody," chirped Erica.

"Any one who isn't satisfied needn't act," endorsed Rachel, with such a
very decided glance at the door that the two delegates could no longer
obtrude their presence, and were obliged to beat an unwilling retreat.

They walked along the passage very dissatisfied with the result of their
mission.

"We've got all the fag of painting these wretched programs, and gained
nothing at all," groused Irene.

"They might have told us first about Bertha. Isn't she an absolute
Jacob--supplanting us like this?"

"Those seniors are _most_ unsympathetic. I want to go back and tell
Rachel what I think of her."

"She'd only say, 'How foreign' if you got excited. And it wouldn't be an
atom of use either."

"They've taken the best place in the program for their stunt."

"Trust the prefects to do that."

"What's to be done about it?"

"It will need some thinking over."

Peachy's agile brains were rarely to be beaten. She slept upon the
problem, and informed her friends afterwards that inspiration came to
her at exactly 3 a.m.

"I know, because I heard the convent clock strike. I sat up in bed and
laughed. I wonder I didn't wake the dormitory, but nobody stirred a
finger. Listen, and I'll explain. The situation at present is this:
Bertha and her Starry Circle have cribbaged our idea and forestalled us
on the program, and are going to act their wretched waxworks first, and
are congratulating themselves that their piece will take the shine out
of ours."

"So it will, I'm afraid. The audience will have sat through the juniors'
play, the seniors' stunt, and the waxworks. They'll be bored stiff to
see our toy-shop straight away afterwards."

"Well, they _shan't_ see it. That's my idea. Let's drop the toy-shop and
do something quite different."

"Drop our toy-shop! O-o-h!"

"We'll do it some other time. But you see we've one advantage on the
program at any rate. We come last."

"That's what we're raving against."

"I know! But if you think of it, it's a great opportunity. Suppose we
do a splendid finishing tableau instead of animated toys? It would make
a magnificent wind-up, and would be a surprise for everybody. Think of
the amazement of the Starry Circle, when they're expecting us to do a
pale copy of their own stunt, to see us posed as a tableau, and
everybody clapping the roof off."

"It would be rather sporty."

"Only I did so want to dress up as a kangaroo," mourned Joan dolefully.

"You shall be Australia instead, and you'll look far nicer. I'll
guarantee to make you ever so pretty. It's to be an Anglo-American
pageant, to symbolize the school. We'll have Columbia and Britannia and
all her colonies, in a sort of _entente cordiale_. You'll see it will
please Miss Morley and Miss Rodgers no end. That Starry Circle will be
just _aching_ with envy. They'll wish they'd been in it. It will
absolutely take the wind out of their sails and lay them flat."

"Peachy Proctor, there's a spice of genius in your composition," said
Jess admiringly. "I could never have thought of that myself."

"Oh, fiddlesticks! Glad you approve though. Now what we've got to do is
to hustle up and get busy over costumes. They'll take some contriving.
Hide all your best things away from the Stars, or they'll be
commandeering them. Mabel has no conscience. And be careful that not the
least teeny-weeny hint leaks out. Let's talk openly about the toy-shop,
and pretend we're still going on practicing for it. It will be all the
bigger sell for them when they find out."

The Camellia Buds, having undertaken to paint six program covers, nobly
did their duty and finished them in the prescribed time. Lorna offered
to take them to Rachel's room, and met with quite a gracious reception
from the head girl. So much so that she ventured to put forward a
suggestion of her own.

"May Part I of the Transition stunt have a time limit?" she asked. "We
want to have some idea when we're to come on."

"Certainly," agreed Rachel. "We can't let Part I go on _ad infinitum_. I
hadn't thought of that. I shall tell Bertha she may have ten minutes and
no longer. I shall ring the curtain bell if she exceeds. I see your
point entirely. It's only fair."

"I was afraid if it was getting near tea-time the audience mightn't want
to stay."

"Exactly. I'll take care your stunt isn't crowded out. Trust that to me.
I'm not head girl here for nothing. And I'm not entirely blind either.
My advice is to look after yourselves."

Lorna returned to the Camellia Buds feeling she had considerably scored
over the Stars. Her previous acquaintance with school theatricals had
taught her that audiences are human, that even teachers will not sit
through too lengthy a performance, and that the lure of tea cannot be
resisted by those who are accustomed to drink it daily at 4 p.m. As
their own dormitory was half in possession of the enemy, Irene and Lorna
adjourned to Peachy's bedroom to make preparations for their costumes,
and held cosy sewing-bees in company with Delia, Jess, Mary, and any
other chums who were able to join them. They kept their properties
safely locked up inside one of the wardrobes in No. 13, and Peachy wore
the key tied under her skirt with a piece of ribbon.

"Because you can't trust that sneaking Mabel not to come in and poke
about," she explained grimly. "I know she wants my dressing-gown."

"We shall have to gallop with our costumes if we're to make anything of
a show," said Sheila, hastily running seams in a creation of scarlet and
blue, destined to clothe Canada.

"I know, but we'll wear them even if they've got raw edges and are
fastened together with pins. I don't suppose the audience will be near
enough to see the stitches. I hope not, at any rate. Mine are absolute
cats' cradles."

By the day of the festival, however, the Camellia Buds were exactly
ready. They had kept their secret strictly, and flattered themselves
that their rivals the Stars were in complete ignorance of their change
of program. The acting was to be in the gymnasium, not in the garden,
for a sirocco wind was blowing and the overcast sky promised rain. It
was a pity, for the pergola would have made such a beautiful background,
and some enthusiasts even petitioned Miss Morley to keep to her original
plan.

"And have you all wet through, and the guests shivering with cold?" she
replied. "No, indeed! Be thankful we have such a large room as the gym
to act in. Otherwise the fête would have been put off altogether."

The girls were allowed, however, to decorate the platform with flowers,
and to hang up Chinese lanterns so as to give a festive appearance to
the scene. The performers donned their costumes in good time, but wore
waterproofs over them to conceal them. They wished to witness each
other's stunts, yet did not want to reveal their own secrets too soon.
There was quite a good audience assembled in the gymnasium. Miss Rodgers
and Miss Morley had sent out many invitations, and some parents and
friends had come over from Naples to combine a peep at the celebrated
Fossato festival with a visit to the school. Irene's cup of joy was full
when, to her utter amazement, she saw her own father, mother, and
brother walk into the room.

"Well! You _are_ a surprise package," she exclaimed, greeting them
gleefully. "Why didn't you write and tell me you were coming?"

"We didn't know ourselves," said Vincent. "We never thought we could
manage to get off, and we didn't want to disappoint you. When does your
stunt come on?"

"Not till the end, so I can sit with you most of the time. Oh! It's
simply too good to have you all turn up like this. Mother darling,
there's a chair for you here, and I'll be in the middle between you and
Daddy."

The entertainment began with a fairy play acted by the juniors. They
looked very pretty in their gauzy garments, and little Désirée, in a
gossamer robe of elfin green, made an attractive queen, so dainty and
ethereal that the audience almost expected to see through her. "What a
sweet child!" was the general comment, as she tripped back in response
to a storm of clapping, to give an encore to her "Moonbeam Song."

The juniors retired, having covered themselves with glory, greatly to
the satisfaction of Miss Morgan, who had spent much time in training
them for their performance.

It was now the turn of the seniors. They had got up an operetta of
Robin Hood, and appeared clad in the orthodox foresters' costume of
Lincoln green, with bows, arrows, and quivers. Stella, as Maid Marian,
and Phyllis, as the Curtle Friar, were especial successes; while Will
Scarlett and Little John gave a noble display of fencing with
quarter-staves, a part of the program which they had practiced in
secrecy, under the instruction of the gymnastic mistress, and now
presented as a complete surprise to the school. Their acting was so
spirited that everybody was quite sorry when the short piece was ended,
and would have liked certain scenes repeated, had not Miss Morley
pointed to her watch and shaken her head emphatically to forbid further
encores. Past experience had warned her not to allow one section of the
school to monopolize an undue share of the time to the exclusion of
others.

"It's the turn of the Transition now," she said. "We shall only just
work through our program by half past four."

Even the Camellia Buds, though they watched with jaundiced eyes, could
not deny that the members of the Starry Circle managed their waxworks
very creditably. Elsie indeed, as Madame de Pompadour, was not
convincing, but Mabel made a distinguished Sir Walter Raleigh, and
Bertha surpassed herself as Queen Elizabeth. The rival sorority, after
witnessing this triumph, was more and more thankful to have abandoned
the idea of acting an animated toy-shop. It would certainly have seemed
tame to continue on the same lines as the prior performance. As it was
they chuckled with satisfaction behind the curtain, while they arranged
themselves for the tableau.

"I guess it will make them sit up," purred Peachy, setting a curl
straight with the aid of her pocket-mirror. "It will be frightfully hard
to keep still, for I shall just want to stare round and see their faces,
but don't alarm yourselves. I promise not to give so much as a blink. I
wouldn't disgrace our stunt for the world. I'll be a rigid marble statue
till the curtain drops."

"Sh! sh! Don't chatter so much," warned Jess. "Aren't you ready yet?
Miss Morley's getting impatient."

"It's nearly half past four, and I expect everybody is longing for
tea," put in Irene.

"They'll have to wait for it till we've done our stunt. We're not going
to be left out," said Peachy, hurriedly taking her pose.

The allegorical scene in which the girls were grouped presented a pretty
picture as the curtain rose.

In the center Agnes and Delia, dressed as Britannia and Columbia,
supported the Union Jack and the Stars and Strips together with a bunch
of camellias as a delicate compliment to the school; Jess, in plaid and
tam-o'-shanter, stood for her native Scotland; Peachy, with fringed
leather leggings and cowboy's hat, was a ranch-girl; Joan in a somewhat
similar costume represented "the bush" in Australia; Sheila in a white
coat trimmed plentifully with cotton wool made a pretty Canada; Irene
was an Irish colleen; Mary, with bunches of mimosa, typified South
Africa; and Esther, gorgeous in Oriental drapery and numerous necklaces,
was an Indian princess. But perhaps the most successful costume of all
was Lorna's. She had been chosen to take the character of New Zealand,
and was dressed in a pale yellow wrapper decorated with beautiful sprays
of tinted leaves. Round her head was a garland of orange blossoms, and
in her arms she held great branches of oranges and lemons, to typify the
fruits of the country she was impersonating. With Lorna's dark eyes and
hair the effect was most striking. She kept her pose admirably, scarcely
blinking an eyelid, though Mary palpably moved, and even Joan was guilty
of a smile. The audience, immensely surprised and pleased with the
tableau, clapped enthusiastically. It was felt to be a very fitting
finish to the festival.

"You kept your secret well, girls," said Miss Morley, as she
congratulated them afterwards. "I'm sure nobody had the least hint. It
was charmingly thought out and arranged. Come along now and have some
tea. It has really been a most successful afternoon."

Audience and performers, the latter in all the glory of their pretty
costumes, mingled together now for conversation and tea-drinking. Irene
quickly joined her family, and had much to say to them, and many
questions to ask about their doings in Naples.

"I say, Renie," whispered Vincent, suddenly interrupting her, "tell me
who's that lovely girl? She looked the best in the whole of your
tableau."

Irene followed his glance to the yellow-clad figure handing the teacups
which Miss Morley was filling.

"That's Lorna. One of my best chums. Yes, that costume suits her. I want
to bring her to speak to Mother. Yes, Lorna, you _must_ come. I simply
shan't let you run away. Mummie darling, this is Lorna. We room
together, you know."

Lorna, dragged forward much against her will to be introduced, stood
shy and blushing, but her heightened color and evident confusion added
to her attraction, and several heads were turned to glance at her among
the guests in that quarter of the room. It was not until this occasion
of the carnival that any one at the Villa Camellia had recognized Lorna
as a budding beauty.

"You ought always to wear yellow," Peachy said to her afterwards. "It's
quite your color. By the by, who chooses your clothes for you?"

"Miss Rodgers generally takes me to Naples and buys them."

"She's no taste. Her ideas run to a gym suit and a school panama and
nothing beyond. I'll give you a tip. Next time you need an evening dress
or a Sunday jumper, engineer it so Miss Morley does the shopping. She'll
get you something pretty, I'll guarantee. She chose that blue _crêpe de
chine_ for Delia. Don't forget. And don't look so fearfully surprised.
If you haven't thought about your clothes before it's time you did. My
dear, you'll pay dressing. Come close and I'll whisper to you: some of
those Stars are just too jealous of you for words. I'm tickled to bits."




CHAPTER XI

Up Vesuvius


On a certain day towards the end of March, Miss Morley, who usually
acted as cicerone and general guide, arranged to take a select little
party up Vesuvius. Irene, Lorna, Peachy, and Delia were among the
favored few, and congratulated themselves exceedingly. It is certainly
not an every-day occurrence for schoolgirls to view a volcano, and this
particular excursion, being long and difficult, was kept as a special
treat, and was regarded as the titbit of the various expeditions from
the Villa Camellia. Many of the girls had, of course, made it on former
occasions, but to those whom Miss Morley was escorting to-day it was all
new.

"I was to have gone last autumn," confided Peachy, "but the fact is I
got into a little fix with Miss Rodgers, and she started on the rampage
and canceled my exeat. I cried till I was simply a sopping sponge, but
she was a perfect crab that day. Lorna, weren't you to have gone too
once before?"

"Yes, and got toothache. Just like my luck. There the others were
starting off, and I was sitting by the stove with a swollen face,
dabbing on belladonna, and Miss Rodgers careering round telling me I
must have it out. Ugh! My ailments always turn up when I'm going
anywhere."

"Well, you're all right to-day at any rate," consoled Delia, rather
unsympathetically.

"If I don't get seasick on the boat."

"Oh, buck up! You mustn't. We'll throw you overboard to the fishes if
you do anything so silly. For goodness' sake don't any one start
symptoms and spoil the fun. Where's Miss Morley? I'm just aching to be
off."

The party left Fossato by the early morning steamer and went straight
to Naples. They drove from the quay to the station, then took the little
local train for Vesuvius. Italian railways generally provide scant
accommodation for the number of passengers, so there ensued a wild
scramble for seats, and it was only by the help of the conductor, whom
she had judiciously tipped, that Miss Morley managed to keep her flock
together, and settle them in one of the small saloon carriages. Here
they were wedged pretty tightly among native Italians, and tourists of
various nations, including some voluble Swedes and a company of dapper
Japanese gentlemen, who were seeing Europe. After much pushing,
crowding, shouting, and gesticulation on the part of both the public and
officials, the train at last started and pursued its jolting and jerky
way. It ran first through the poorer district of Naples, where
dilapidated houses, whose faded walls showed traces of former gay pink,
blue, or yellow color-wash, stood in the midst of vegetable gardens;
then, the slums left behind, the line passed a long way among vineyards
and orchards of almond, peach, and cherry that were just bursting into
glorious lacy blossom. The railway banks were gay with the flowers which
March scatters in Southern Italy, red poppies, orange marigolds, lupins,
campanulas, purple snapdragons, and wild mignonette, growing anywhere
among stones and rocks, with the luxuriance that in northern countries
is reserved for June.

At Torre Annunziata the party from the Villa Camellia all crowded to the
carriage window, for Miss Morley had something to point out to them.

"We're passing over the lava formed by the great eruption in 1906. The
whole of the railway line and ever so many houses were buried then.
Don't you see bits of them peeping out over there?"

"Why, yes, it looks like cinders," commented Lorna.

"They're great masses of crumbling lava turning into soil. Wait till we
get farther on, then you'll see lava more in its raw stage. Very soon we
shall be passing over the top of Herculaneum. The ancient city lies
buried thirty feet below the surface."

"Aren't they ever going to excavate it like they did Pompeii?"

"The trouble is that the modern town of Pugliano is built over the top,
and naturally the owners don't want their houses pulled down, whatever
treasures in the way of Greek or Roman antiquities may lie buried
underneath. Isn't the view of the Bay of Naples beautiful from here?"

"Yes, and the flowers. It's like fairyland."

At Pugliano the party left the train, and after a long and tiresome wait
at the station changed to the light electric railway that was to take
them up Vesuvius. The little carriage resembled a tramcar, and its wide
glass windows afforded excellent views of the scenery _en route_.
Up--up--up they went, gradually getting higher and higher. It was
marvelous how the vegetation altered as they ascended. The cactuses,
olives, almonds, and peach orchards gave way to hillsides covered with
small chestnut, oak, or poplar trees, and the poppies and daisies were
succeeded by broom bushes and clumps of rosemary. They were getting on
to the region of the lava, and all the ground was brown, like newly
turned peat. Men were busy digging terraces in the volcanic earth, to
plant vines, working calmly as if the great cone above them had never
belched forth fire and ashes.

"How _dare_ they live here?" shuddered Peachy, pointing to the tiny
dwellings which had been reared here and there. "When they see all the
ruin round them, aren't they afraid? What makes them go back?"

"The ground is so rich," explained Miss Morley. "Nothing grows vines so
splendidly as volcanic earth. The people get fatalistic, and think it
worth risking their lives to have these fruitful little farms. They say
the mountain may not be angry again for years, and they will take their
chance."

"It's smoking now," said Lorna.

"I suppose it's safe?" asked Delia anxiously.

"Perfectly safe to-day or we shouldn't have been allowed to go up in the
electric railway. Do you see that big building--the observatory? Careful
investigations are made every day of the crater, and the results
telegraphed down to Naples. If there were the slightest hint of danger
the trains would be stopped and tourists turned back."

The journey was ever upwards, over great wastes of rough brown lava,
which looked as if some giant, in play, had squeezed out the contents of
enormous tubes of oil paint on to the mighty palette of the mountain
side. The air had grown fresh and cold, for they were at an altitude
approaching 4000 feet, and, but for the scenery, might have imagined
themselves in Wales or Scotland.

The light railway ended at a small station, where there was the
observatory and a hotel. All round were masses of enormous cinders, and
above, a grim sight, towered the immense cone of Vesuvius. To scale the
tremendous incline to the summit there was a funicular railway, to which
our party now transferred themselves, sitting on seats raised one above
another as in the gallery of a theater. It was here that, if the events
of the day are to be truly chronicled, we must record a scrimmage
between Irene and her chum, Peachy. The conductor of the light railway
had gathered a bunch of rosemary _en route_, and he now approached the
funicular and bestowed his offering upon Peachy, who happened to be
sitting nearest to the end. She was immensely gratified at the
attention, sniffed the fragrant nosegay, and handed it on for admiration
to Lorna, who, after also burying her nose in it, passed it to Irene.
The latter ought to have realized it was not her own property, but
unfortunately didn't. She calmly appropriated the bunch, and distributed
it in portions to those nearest her. Peachy's cheeks flamed. She was a
hot-tempered little soul underneath her gay banter.

"Well! Of all cool cheek," she exploded. "That was _my_ bouquet. It was
given to _me_, not to you, Renie Beverley. Next time you start being
charitable use your own flowers, not mine. You haven't left me a single
piece."

"I'm sorry," blushed Irene, trying to collect some portion at least of
her offerings to hand back to the lawful owner. "I thought they were
given to me."

"No, you didn't, you simply bagged them," snapped Peachy. "I'm not
friends with you, so don't talk to me any more," and Peachy turned a red
offended face out of the carriage window.

Irene might have apologized further, but the funicular gave a mighty
jerk at that moment, and the carriage started. Up--up went the little
train, working on wire ropes like a bucket coming out of a well. Higher
and higher and higher it rose up the terrific incline, over masses of
cinders, towards the thick cloud of smoke that loomed above. It stopped
at last at a big iron gate, which opened to admit the passengers on to
the summit. Here the guides were waiting, and after some parleying in
Italian, Miss Morley engaged a couple of them to escort her party. Led
by these men, who knew every inch of the way, they started to walk to
the crater of the volcano. A cinder path had been made along the edge of
the cone, having on the left side a steep ridge of ashes, and on the
right a sheer drop of many thousand feet. From this strange road there
were weird and beautiful effects--for it was above the region of the
clouds, which floated below, sometimes hiding the landscape, and
sometimes revealing glorious stretches of country, with gleams of
sunshine falling on the white houses of towns miles below, and blue
reaches of sea with mountains beyond. Great volumes of smoke kept coming
down from the summit, and blowing in a dense cloud, then clearing for a
few minutes and forming again. There were booming sounds like the firing
of cannons that seemed to issue from the smoke.

Very much awed by these impressive surroundings the party kept close
together. The guides, in their gray uniforms and caps with red bands,
were a comforting feature of the excursion. But for their encourageme

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