"I—I was too late," stammered Sarah.
"Well, come now, and to-morrow morning you will begin a little earlier." Miss Ellingwood held out a kindly hand. "Won't you?"
Sarah stammered another "Yes, ma'am." She could not say that she had been up since five o'clock, because that would involve explanation, and she did not wish to be a tale-bearer.
She caught Ellen Ritter's eye as they went down between the long lines of tables, and Ellen grinned and nudged Mabel. But Sarah did not care. Some one was interested in her. Miss Ellingwood had left her breakfast and had come all the way upstairs to find her. She ate her breakfast cheerfully, answering shyly the remarks of her companions.
"Now, when the next bell rings, you must go to the chapel," said Miss Ellingwood. "Take a tablet and pencil with you, and then you can write down your classes for the day. And if you get into any difficulty, come to me. The bell will ring at eight o'clock, and you know where the chapel is."
At half-past seven Sarah took her tablet and two neatly sharpened lead pencils, and stole out of her room. Nobody should prevent her from being on time now. She went down quietly and opened the chapel door. Then she realized that she had forgotten the number of her seat. If she had such difficulty with little things, what would she do when lessons began?
Suddenly she remembered with a throb of relief the chandelier whose dripping she had feared. She sat down in a chair which was, as nearly as she could guess, the one she had occupied the night before, and bent her head back to look up. Yes, it was from this spot that she had seen the dangerous candles. She sighed thankfully, and proceeded to write her name on her note-books, and then to read the school catalogue, which gave a list of her lessons.
There would be Physiology, Arithmetic, Spelling, and Political Geography, to begin with. In each of these she would have three recitations a week, and she must pass an examination in them before the State Board at the end of the year in order to enter the Junior class. Besides, she would have less frequent lessons in Latin, History, and Grammar. In these branches she would not have to be examined, except by her teachers, until the end of her Junior year. Each week she would also have an hour's exercise in drawing and in vocal music. And every other day she would have to spend three quarters of an hour in the gymnasium. Sarah shook her head solemnly. It seemed like a large contract for so small a girl.
All the morning she went to classes, gaining in each room a new book, a new note on her tablet, and a redder flush on her cheeks. By noon the pile of books had grown almost to her chin. She carried them proudly across the campus and up to her room.
It was going to be hard, but not as hard as she had feared. She had naturally a quick mind, far quicker than she suspected. There were two branches in which she had a valuable advantage. Political Geography would be only a review. Her father had been a dreamer, loving accounts of strange cities and far countries, and in the long evenings after he had become ill, he and Sarah had pored over the atlas, following William on his long journey, and trying to picture the strange countries on the other side of the world. There were few countries which Sarah could not bound, few rivers and cities which she could not locate.