At noon Miss Ellingwood tried to coax Sarah to eat.
"Were they hard, Sarah?"
"I—I guess so."
"You must lie down for a while after dinner," said Miss Ellingwood solicitously. "And you mustn't say a word or think about examinations."
"Yes, ma'am," answered Sarah obediently. She had meant to ask Miss Ellingwood to help her to fathom the mystery of the morning's examinations, but if Miss Ellingwood did not wish to talk about examinations, she would not insist. But she did not lie down. She hunted up her spelling-book and glanced once more at "phthisis" and "relieve" and "receive," and all the words which bothered her.
It was the middle of the afternoon before she realized that she had written the answers to seven sets of questions.
Several of the grammar questions had baffled her completely, and when an examiner had laid on her desk a sheet of drawing-paper, and had intimated that she was to draw the fern which was placed near her on a table, she had lifted her hand to protest. But no one seemed to see her hand, and she lowered it again and set desperately to work.
Edward Ellis, next to her, was also drawing the fern, and he looked at her wonderingly. Then he remembered that she had been taking some Junior courses. It was that which had made her ill. Perhaps they were going to let her try the Junior examinations. And at any rate the Board knew what it was about. Edward stood in great awe of that august body, and did not dare to offer any objections to its proceedings.
Sarah was told also to draw the steps leading to the platform, and she proceeded to obey. She had had only elementary drawing. She saw with alarm that the boys near her were working with careful measurements and ruling. She knew nothing about ruling, or about holding up one's pencil and squinting past it, or the rules of perspective by which they worked so carefully. She only drew the steps as she had drawn things for the twins, as they looked to her.
"Political Geography and Arithmetic and Physiology and Spelling I was to be examined in," she said to herself. "I have been examined in Arithmetic and Physiology and History and Latin and Physical Geography and Grammar and Drawing, but not yet in Spelling or Political Geography. Most of these things do not come till next year. Ach, I do not know what it means!"