“I do,” Prue interrupted. “You had a snapper off, and you thought that would show less than an ordinary pin.”
“Untidy little wretch you are,” Ann agreed.
The rest looked at Gladys’ cuff and, sure enough, there was a snapper off. Gladys, under their laughing scrutiny, was no whit embarrassed.
“Course I’m untidy,” she agreed; “that’s because I’m an artist, and it’s being done this year. You couldn’t expect me to be as neat as Prue, the immaculate.”
Prue laughed good-naturedly. “Meaning I am not an artist,” she remarked. “Well, nobody will dispute that with you, least of all Miss Remsted.”
The rest of the old girls laughed as at some well known joke and the twins smiled in sympathy.
“Prue tried to have a crush on Miss Remsted last year,” Poppy explained. “We don’t encourage them—crushes, I mean—at Hilltop, but Prue is stubborn—comes from New England, you know, where the word was coined—and she would have a crush in spite of the fact that she had been here two years and knew that we would have to take drastic steps to cure her.”
“You did and I’m cured; can’t we spare them the harrowing details?” Prue protested.
“No; it may be a lesson they’ll need, and besides, Poppy loves to point a moral,” Gwen remarked. “Go on, Poppy; let’s hear the awful end.”
“It’s coming; just you listen.” Poppy directed her story to the twins. “Prue suddenly decided, about the middle of the term, that she was a budding young artist and that all she needed was a little special instruction, so she went to Miss Hull and got permission to take special art. Then she went to Miss Remsted——.” Poppy paused to chuckle in anticipation.