“What a perfectly silly way for that girl to act!” Janet exclaimed. “I’d like to box her ears.”
“So would I,” Phyllis agreed. “Come along; let’s go down and wait for Sally.”
They went downstairs arm in arm and across the broad piazza. Phyllis sat down with her back against one of the big pillars, and Janet stood on the top step.
The close-cropped green lawn fell away from the house in a gracious slope to meet a fringe of trees that deepened into a woods at all sides. The tennis courts were visible far away to the right. They were filled with girls, and in the quiet of the late afternoon their voices floated laughing on the breeze. To the left the archery target blazed in its fresh coat of bright colors.
Archery was the chief sport of Hilltop. Each year teams were chosen from both wings, and on Archery Day the big silver loving cup was engraved with the name of the girl who made the highest score; then it was replaced in the center of the mantel-piece in the hall to await the next year.
Archery Day came at the end of the term, and, although the days before and after it were filled with tennis matches, basketball, and running, it stood out in importance above them all.
The tryout for possible candidates was to take place the following week. The girls in the four upper classes shot five arrows, and the committee comprised with the Senior class and the faculty judged. Those selected worked hard and practiced, and just before the Christmas holidays the teams were chosen.
“Did you ever shoot a bow and arrow, Jan?” Phyllis inquired.
“Loads of them,” Janet replied. “Harry Waters used to make them for me. Little short ones made from the branches of trees, and arrows with a pin in the end of them. Harry was very good at it, but I was terribly clumsy.”
“I don’t believe it,” Phyllis protested; “you have a straight eye anyway. Look at the way you shot Sulky Prescott’s gun last summer.”