"I wouldn't parade such a woebegone face, whatever might be the depths of my misery," returned Chatty briskly.
"I'm always glad to come back," declared Dorothy Arkwright. "I like school. It's fun to meet everybody again, and arrange about cricket, and the Debating Society, and the Natural History Club. There's so much going on at St. Chad's."
"No one has answered my question yet," remarked Madge Summers. "Are there any new girls?"
Chatty wriggled herself into a more comfortable position between Adeline Vaughan and Ruth Latimer.
"I think there are about a dozen altogether. Vivian Holmes says there are four at St. Bride's, three at St. Aldwyth's, two at the School House, and two at St. Hilary's. I saw one of them arriving at the same time as I did, and Miss Cavendish was gushing over another in the library; and Marian Spencer has brought a sister—she introduced her to me just now."
"But what about St. Chad's?"
"We've only one, I believe, though Flossie Taylor, the Hammond-Smiths' cousin, has moved here from St. Bride's. She was always destined for a Chaddite, you know, only there wasn't room for her till the Richardsons left."
"She's no great acquisition," said Dorothy Arkwright. "I hate girls to change their quarters. When once they start at a house, they ought to stick to it."
"Well, she wants to be with her cousins, I suppose," put in Madge Summers. "Who's our new girl?"
"I don't know. I haven't heard anything about her."