"It's going to be really a swell thing for once," said Deirdre. "I hear Miss Birks is getting new curtains—those old ones are quite worn out—and the joiner is to come and fix a rod. And there's to be tea after the entertainment. Such heaps of people are coming!"
"Who?" asked Gerda.
"Oh, Major and Mrs. Hargreaves and their little boys, and Canon Hall and Miss Hall, and Dr. and Mrs. Dawes, and all the four Miss Hirsts, and the Rector of Kergoff, and Mr. Lawson, and of course Mrs. Trevellyan."
"And Ronnie?"
"Rather! We wouldn't leave Ronnie out of it! Miss Herbert is to come too, if she hasn't gone home for the holidays."
"You've never seen Mrs. Trevellyan yet, Gerda?" put in Dulcie.
"Only in church."
"Well, but I mean to speak to. You didn't go to Ronnie's birthday party, and the day she came here you were as shy as a baby, and scooted out of the way."
"I can't help being shy," returned Gerda, blushing up to the very tips of her ears.
"Why, there you are, turning as red as a boiled lobster! Miss Birks says shyness is mostly morbid self-consciousness, and isn't anything to be proud of. Why don't you try to get out of it? It looks right-down silly to colour up like that over simply nothing at all. I'd be ashamed of it!" said Dulcie, who could be severe on other people's faults, though she demanded charity for her own.