Nat saw the impression she had made and hastened to deepen it.
"Has Allison, the one most injured, said or done anything to Monica? You know she hasn't. She's been content to leave the matter in Prinny's hands. It isn't like Allison to hit anyone who's down. Besides, Monica's sorry for it now. She told me so."
Even Glenda, who was by no means an ill-natured girl, began to waver. "Well—if Deirdre and Pam don't mind, I don't suppose it really matters very much who goes with you," she said weakly.
There was still one dissentient voice.
"I think it matters very much," Irene interjected sharply. "Personally I refuse to take part if Monica Carr does. She can't play fair."
Nat answered smartly. "I don't see that you have any right to criticize anyone for not playing fair. Do you call it playing fair to pry into and purloin another girl's private correspondence?"
Irene subsided with flaming cheeks and a look on her face that was half anger, half shame.
So Nat got her way in the end. Punctually at a quarter to two the next afternoon a large crowd of girls assembled at the school gates. Nat and Monica, the former looking like a large man o' war with a small craft in tow, and each with a couple of bags bursting with paper scent slung across her shoulder, stood by the gates in readiness for the start. They set off down the road at a brisk pace as the church clock struck the quarter. The rest of the girls skipped and jumped about impatiently till, a quarter of an hour later, Miss Cazalet gave the signal to start and they all streamed into the road after the thin trail of paper scent.
The hunt had begun.