"Ever so many smart people will be there," said Laura delightedly. "Tommiekins is sending out heaps of invitations. I know, because Miss Kennedy told Consie, and Consie told Nita Paget. The Bishop will make a speech."
"And what are we going to do?"
"Stand round and listen, and look intelligent and appreciative, and all the rest of it, I suppose. We'll have to be saints during the ceremony, but we'll have some fun afterwards. D'you know the school's to be thrown open to all sorts of visitors? Not only old fogies who make speeches, but other people. The day girls may each ask three friends, and they can bring brothers if they like."
"You don't say so! Miss Thompson is coming on. Are you certain?"
"It's quite true," confirmed Avelyn. "I was allowed an invitation card too, and I've asked Mother and Daphne and David, and I've got Pamela to ask Anthony with one of her spare invitations."
"What sport!"
"We'll all have to wear our best dresses," said Janet.
"Rather! You bet we do!"
In preparation for the coming event, a wave of what Miss Hopkins would have dubbed "worldliness" swept over the Cowslip Room. The girls reviewed their frocks critically. Laura implored Miss Kennedy to allow hers to be sent to the dressmaker, to be lengthened two inches. Janet borrowed the last drops of Ethelberga's before-the-war bottle of benzoline, to remove a stain left by the dropping, butter-side down, of a piece of muffin. Avelyn brushed her hair every night with eau de Cologne to make it glossy. Ethelberga, in defiance of food saving, begged oatmeal from the cook, and rubbed it on her face to improve her complexion. Irma, after criticizing the costumes of her friends, sprang a surprise on them.
"I've sent home for a new dress," she announced carelessly.