MISS LEECE
Yes, there stood the hideous, grotesque effigy just where her abductors had left her the night before, her green veil floating in the breezes. As a figure of fun and an object of ridicule, she might not have created more than a ripple with the faculty. But it was evident that Miss Leece's function, even in effigy, was to make trouble.
And trouble was certainly brewing that memorable morning. The figure itself might never have been recognized, but a placard which had been pinned on the front of the old ulster left no room for doubt. Across it had been inscribed in large printed letters:
"The Most Unpopular Teacher in School."
No one dared take the effigy away for fear of being implicated. Everybody had seen it, both men and women professors and the boys and girls of the two schools. But it was not until Miss Thompson, the principal of the Girls' High School, had arrived that the figure was removed.
"How could those boys have been so mean!" exclaimed Grace to her three friends just before the gong sounded. "They might have known what would happen."
There was an ominous quiet in the various class rooms all morning; but nothing was said or done to indicate just when the storm would burst. When the first class in algebra met, Anne trembled with fear, but Miss Leece, in a robin's egg-blue dress, which offset the angry hue of her complexion, was apparently too angry to trust herself to look in the direction of the young girl and the lesson progressed without incident.
However, she was only biding her time.
"Miss Pierson," she said, toward the end of the lesson, in a voice so rasping as to make the girls fairly shiver, "go to the blackboard and demonstrate this problem."
Then she read aloud in the same disagreeable voice, the following difficult problem:
"'Train A starts from Chicago going thirty miles an hour. An hour later Train B starts from Chicago going thirty-five miles an hour. How far from Chicago will they be when Train B passes Train A?'"
The girls looked up surprised. The problem was well in advance of what they had been studying and Miss Leece was really asking Anne to recite something she had not yet learned.
Anne hardly knew how to reply to the terrible woman who stood glowering at her as if she would like to crush her to bits.
"I'm sorry," said the girl. "I cannot."
"Miss Nesbit," said the teacher, "will you demonstrate this problem?"
Miriam rose with a little smile of triumph on her face and went to the blackboard, where she worked out the problem.
"Why, what on earth does the woman mean?" whispered Grace. "Are we expected to learn lessons we have never been taught and has that horrid Miriam been studying ahead?"
"I think I must be dreaming," replied Anne, looking sorrowfully at Miss Leece.
"Miss Pierson," thundered the teacher, "you are aware, I believe, that I permit no conversation in this class. Stupidity and inattention are not to be supported in any student, and I must ask you to leave the room."
Anne rose in a dazed sort of way, looking very small and shabby as she left the room.
But Miss Leece was not to come off so easily in the fight, and Anne had a splendid champion in Grace Harlowe, who could not endure injustice and was fearless where her rights or her friends' rights were concerned.
She rose quietly and faced the angry teacher, who already regretted having gone so far.
"If Miss Pierson is to be ordered from the room, Miss Leece, I shall follow her. I spoke to her first. I was naturally surprised that you gave out a problem so far in advance of our regular work. It is doubtful if any girl in the class could do it except Miriam, and she must have been prepared."
"Miss Harlowe," said Miss Leece, stamping her foot, and again giving way to rage, "I must ask you to take your seat at once and never interfere again with the way I conduct this class."
"You conduct this class with injustice and violence, Miss Leece," said Grace, turning very white, but holding herself in admirable control considering the conduct of the older woman.
"I am in no humor to be answered back this morning, Miss Harlowe, and I would advise you to be careful," continued the enraged woman. "I have had enough to try me since last night and this morning. Miss Pierson must answer to the principal for those insults, and her insubordination just now has only made matters worse."
"Miss Pierson has nothing to answer for which I have not, and I shall join her," replied Grace, and she left the room.
Miss Leece was about to continue the lesson when Jessica, pale and trembling, rose and followed her friend. Nora was next to go and in another moment there was not a girl left in the algebra class except Miriam and her four particular friends. The gong sounded as the last pupil closed the door behind her, but there was little doubt that the first class in algebra had gone on a strike.
The noon recess gong had sounded before the girls were able to meet and talk about the incident, and, during the time that intervened, Anne had received a summons in the form of a small note to meet the principal in her office at three that afternoon. She said nothing to her friends, however, and hid the envelope in her pocket.
The girls in IV. algebra gathered around their friends to hear the story. They were indignant and expressed their readiness to join the strike out of sympathy in case there was any more trouble.
"They have no right to put such a violent woman over us," said Grace, as she nibbled at a pickle and a cracker in the locker room. "I wish they would give me the opportunity. I should be more than willing to testify to her behavior before the entire faculty and the school board combined."
Anne, herself, the center of the whole affair was very quiet. This remarkable young girl seemed to possess some secret force that she was able to draw upon when she most needed it.
"Anne, you precious child," exclaimed the impetuous Nora, "you must not get scared. Whatever happens, the whole class means to stand by you. Don't we, girls?"
"Yes," came from all sides.
"I don't think anything in particular will happen," replied Anne. "I believe Miss Leece really wants to prevent my winning the prize. That's all."
"She has certainly adopted a pet," cried Marian Barber.
"What did Miriam Nesbit mean by studying ahead like that?" exclaimed another. "It was disloyal to the whole class."
"It looks very much as if they had fixed it up between them," continued Grace. "I'm sorry about the effigy, but I won't stand that kind of favoritism. It's mean and underhanded."
After school Anne lingered in the corridor until the other girls had gone. Then she made her way slowly to the office of the principal. "Come in," came the answer to her timid knock.
Miss Thompson, the principal, was a fine woman, much beloved by the people of Oakdale where she had served as principal of the Girls' High School for many years. She had adjusted numerous difficulties in her time, but never such a knotty problem as the present one. It was incredible that Anne Pierson, who stood so well in her classes that she had already been mentioned by the faculty, should have engaged in such an escapade as Miss Leece had accused her of.
"Sit down," she said kindly to the young girl, whose small, tired face appealed to her sympathies. "What is this trouble between you and Miss Leece, Miss Pierson?" she continued, plunging into the subject.
"I do not know myself, Miss Thompson," answered Anne quietly.
"But she accuses you of rather terrible things, Miss Pierson," went on the principal, picking up a slip of paper and reading aloud, "'inattention, insubordination, impertinence and a tendency to make trouble.' Have you any answer to make to these charges?"
"No," replied Anne.
"Have you nothing to say?"
"Only that they are untrue."
"Miss Pierson," continued the principal, opening a closet door, "do you recognize this figure."
