“Tell me, tell me quickly!” said Daisy, with a stamp of her foot. “If you don’t, I will ruff your hair all up until it is in a most fearful tangle, and I will throw your ribbon, your combs, and those lovely tortoise-shell pins all out of the window. A nice sight you will look then, old thing.”
“And nice beans, a regular boiling of them, you would get for doing it,” laughed Joan, who loved to tease Daisy into an exhibition of this sort.
“Tell me, tell me!” cried Daisy, with another stamp of her foot.
“My father told me,” said Joan, nodding her head. “He said that Grimes Fleming—Rhoda’s father, you know—was closely related to the Herschsteins. It has been kept very dark, because, of course, no one in any way connected with that family would have been received at the Compton Schools if it had been known. Dad would not have told me about it if I had not insisted that this floor was haunted by Amelia’s ghost, and that the spirit actually left books in the studies. I thought my dad would have had a fit then, he was so choked with laughing. That is when he told me, and he said I was to keep it dark, for it did not seem fair that Rhoda should have the sins of those who went before fastened on her shoulders to weigh her down.”
“It isn’t playing the game, though, to let a girl like that win the Lamb Bursary,” said Daisy in a tone that was fairly shocked.
“Just what I said to my dad. But he told me it was up to me to stop her doing it by jolly well beating her myself. I think I would have a real vigorous try to do it, too, if it were not for Dorothy. I might beat Rhoda if I tried hard enough, and kept on trying. Dorothy is a different matter; she is forcing the pace so terribly that I can’t face the fag of it all. Rhoda would not put out her strength as she does if it were not for her spite against Dorothy.”
“Why does she hate Dorothy so badly?” asked Daisy, whose excitement had subsided, leaving her more serious than usual.
“Ask me another,” said Joan, flinging up her hands with a gesture that was meant to be dramatic. “I think it would need a Sherlock Holmes to find that out. I have pumped her—I have watched her—but I am no nearer getting to the bottom of it. It is my belief that Dorothy knows something about Rhoda, and Rhoda knows she knows it. Oh dear, what a mix up of words, but you know what I mean.”
“I don’t think she ought to be allowed to win the Lamb Bursary—it was not meant for a girl of that sort.” Daisy sounded reproachful now, for it did seem a shame that the chief prize of the school should go to one who was unworthy.
Joan wagged her head with a knowing air. “I know how you feel, for it is just my opinion. I am keeping quiet now, as I promised my dad I would. If Dorothy or Hazel or any one else wins the Bursary, then there will be no need to say anything at all; but if Miss Rhoda comes out top, then I am going to say things, and do things, and stir up no end of a dust.”