The Lower Fifth behaved themselves with exemplary virtue in the classroom that morning, and in due course the new mistress arrived. She was not introduced to her form until the next day. The girls were not very favourably impressed by her appearance. Miss Burton was thin and rather angular, sandy-haired and spectacled, and she gave the impression of being both irritable and exacting—an impression which the Lower Fifth found amply justified when they came into close contact with their new mistress. Miss Burton was really one of those people who ought never to have gone in for teaching at all, having no real liking for her profession, nor any sympathy with or understanding of girls. She very soon succeeded in ruffling the feelings of the Lower Fifth, and before the first morning was ended the whole form was in open rebellion.
It was over Gerry Wilmott that the rupture took place. Margaret Taylor, who occupied the desk next to Gerry's, was unable to find her place during the literature lesson, having, through inattention, missed the announcement Miss Burton made in the beginning of the class. The girls were reading aloud in turn a play of Shakespeare's, and as her turn drew nearer and nearer Margaret fumbled desperately with the pages, finally turning an imploring glance upon Gerry, who was watching her futile struggles with nervous apprehension. Gerry was only too glad to do anything for anybody,—the ostracism in which she was kept by the rest of the form precluded her as a rule from even offering aid on such an occasion as this,—and she leant over to her neighbour's desk and pointed it out, just at the very moment when Miss Burton happened to be looking that way. The new mistress banged on her desk with such emphasis that the girl who was reading at the moment stopped suddenly, and the class looked up in amazement, while Gerry gave a frightened little jump.
"You, girl! What is your name?" said Miss Burton, pointing her pencil at Gerry.
"Gerry—I mean Geraldine Wilmott," stammered Gerry.
"What do you mean by whispering to another girl during class?" demanded the mistress, blinking furiously at the culprit through her glasses.
"I—I wasn't whispering," said Gerry. "I—I was only showing Margaret the place."
"Don't prevaricate!" thundered Miss Burton. "You were whispering. I saw you."
Up shot Margaret's hand.
"Please, Miss Burton," said that young lady indignantly, moved for once to take the unpopular new girl's part, "she wasn't whispering. I'd lost my place, and I made signs to her to show me, and she was only pointing it out with her pencil."
"I don't believe either of you," said the new mistress. Then with a fiery glance at Gerry, she said ferociously: