"It was a near squeak!" she thought. "The Acid Drop would have made a fearful row if she'd caught me. It makes one feel rocky even to think of it. Oh dear! I must brace up if I'm to get all the rest of this done before tea."
She wrote away wearily until the dressing-bell rang, then washed her hands and went into the hall. The one topic of conversation at the tables was hockey. The points of the various members of the teams were criticized freely. It appeared to have been an exciting afternoon. A sense of ill usage filled Marjorie that she had not been present.
"I think the Empress was awfully hard on me," she groused. "I believe she'd have let me off more lightly if Norty hadn't given her such a list of my crimes. I wish I could catch Norty tripping! But teachers never do trip."
"Why, no, of course not. They wouldn't be teachers if they did," laughed Betty. "The Empress would soon pack them off."
"I wonder if they ever get into trouble and the Empress reprimands them in private," surmised Chrissie.
"Oh, that's likely enough, but of course we don't hear about it."
"Miss Gordon and Miss Hulton had a quarrel last year," said Sylvia.
"Yes, and Miss Hulton left. Everybody said she was obliged to go because Mrs. Morrison took Miss Gordon's part."
That evening an unprecedented and extraordinary thing happened. Brackenfield College stood in a dip of the hills not very far away from the sea. As at most coast places, the rules in the neighbourhood of Whitecliffe were exceedingly strict. Not the least little chink of a light must be visible after dusk, and blinds and curtains were drawn most carefully over the windows. Being on the west coast, they had so far been immune from air raids, but in war-time nobody knew from what quarter danger might come, or whether a stray Zeppelin might some night float overhead, or a cruiser begin shelling the town. On the whole, the College was considered as safe a place as any in England, and parents had not scrupled to send their daughters back to school there. On this particular evening one of the housemaids had been into Whitecliffe, and, instead of returning by the high road and up the drive, took a short cut by the side lane and the kitchen garden. To her amazement, she noticed that in one of the windows of the Observatory a bright light was shining. It was on the side away from the high road, but facing the sea, and could probably be discerned at a great distance. She hurried indoors and informed Mrs. Morrison, who at once visited the Observatory, and found there a lighted bicycle lamp, which had been placed on the window sill.
So sinister an incident was a matter for immediate enquiry. The Principal was horror-stricken. Girls, teachers, and servants were questioned, but nobody admitted anything. The lamp, indeed, proved to be one which Miss Duckworth had missed from her bicycle several days before. It was known that she had been lamenting its loss. Whether the light had been put as a signal or as a practical joke it was impossible to say, but if it had been noticed by a special constable it would have placed Brackenfield in danger of an exceedingly heavy fine.