As she finished they arrived at the door of the study which Irene shared with Glenda, and without pausing Irene hurriedly pushed it open and entered.
She gazed round in anger and astonishment. "Why, she isn't here!" Barely had the words left her lips before there was the slam of a door behind her, and though she sprang round like a flash, the key turned in the lock a second before she could seize the handle and wrench the door open. In vain she tugged and shook it.
"Let me out, you little wretch!" she cried furiously. "This is one of your abominable tricks, I suppose."
There was a chuckle from the other side of the door. "'Will you come into my parlour?' said the spider to the fly," Monica sang softly and aggravatingly.
Irene banged upon the door and even kicked it in a most unladylike manner, "What have you done this for?" she demanded hotly. "Let me out at once or I shall never catch my train."
Again came that aggravating chuckle. "That's exactly what I don't want you to do," Monica replied. "Then Nat will get a look in. Don't you think it clever of us to work it out so beautifully? It isn't a bit of good banging on the door or shouting from the window. There's no one anywhere about. I looked to see before I came after you. The girls have all gone out to hockey or netball or for walks, and Miss Cazalet, the only mistress whose room is near, has gone with the hockey team, as you know. As for the window, it overlooks the kitchen garden and I'm sure there's nobody there now."
Irene glanced round in despair. According to the little clock ticking loudly on the mantel-piece it would take her all her time to catch the train even if she were released immediately. She went to the window and shouted, but there was no one in sight; her cry was apparently heard only by a few straggling cabbages below, so she returned to the door and resumed her fruitless pounding. There was no response to her calls and bangings. Evidently Monica had gone.
More than half an hour elapsed before Irene escaped from her prison.
A Second Form youngster on an errand to one of the dormitories heard her and, greatly surprised, released her by turning the kev which was in the lock on the outside.