"Why? Are the lessons so very difficult?" questioned Geraldine.
"Oh, it isn't the lessons," replied her informant. "Lessons don't really count very much at school, except with the mistresses. It's games and rules and—and—well, school etiquette in general, you know. I expect it will take you quite a term to learn all our school ways."
"Will it?" said Geraldine, looking rather alarmed. Jack hastened to reassure her.
"You needn't look so scared about it! Of course there are heaps of unwritten rules and things which you'll have to pick up, besides all the rules which the mistresses make. But people make allowances for you your first term, and I'll help you a lot, if you'd like me to. I've been here for years and years and years, and there isn't much about the old Priory I couldn't put you up to—though I'm not specially good at lessons," Jack added, with becoming modesty.
"Oh, I wish you would! Tell me about things, I mean. What happens next this evening? And what time do we start lessons, and when do we play games, and all that?"
"I'd better begin at the beginning," said Jack, nothing loath at the opportunity of exercising her tongue. Jack was an inveterate chatterbox. "Getting-up bell goes at seven, breakfast is at quarter to eight. Eight-fifteen to eight-thirty we tidy cubicles and make our beds. Then there's half an hour free, which we're supposed on fine days to spend in the quad or somewhere out in the grounds, before the bell goes at nine o'clock for prayers. We all assemble then in the Great Hall and march into Chapel for prayers, in the order of forms. You'd better stick to me to-morrow morning, and I'll show you where to stand and sit. After prayers, we go to our form rooms and work until eleven. At eleven there's half an hour's recess, when you can get cocoa and biscuits, if you want them, in the dining-hall. Then lessons again until one o'clock, tidy yourself, and dinner at quarter-past. Then there's a free time until half-past two, when either you have to go for a walk or play games."
"May you choose which you do?" asked Geraldine.
"Rather not!" answered Jack emphatically. "You're marked down which you're to be. Usually you get about four games' afternoons a week, and the rest walks. In the summer we do prep in the afternoon, and have games after tea. But this term we do prep in the evening, and have our hockey in the afternoon. Do you play hockey?"
"No," confessed Geraldine, rather uneasily.
"That's a pity," said her new friend. "How was that? Wasn't there any sort of a club in the village where you lived?"