Marian's face lighted. "I wish I could sit in that empty back seat all day," she eagerly suggested.
The teacher smiled. "You may pack your books, Marian, and sit there until I miss you so much I shall need you down here again."
Marian knew what that meant. "I'll be awful good," she promised. "I mean, I'll be ever so good."
So Marian sat in a back seat that last day and in spite of her sore throat and headache, she was happy. It was triumph to sit in a back seat. She was glad the children looked around and smiled. They might get bad marks for turning their heads, to be sure, but what of it? At recess Marian walked across the schoolroom once or twice, then returned to her seat. At noon she refused to go to the basement with the children to eat her luncheon. In fact, she couldn't eat. Marian wondered why time seemed so long.
When the history class was called to the recitation seat early in the afternoon, one little girl was motionless when the signals were given.
"Marian Lee's asleep," volunteered the child who sat in front of her.
At that, Marian raised her head and stumbled to her class.
"Don't you feel well?" asked the teacher.
Marian shook her head. Her cheeks were crimson. She had never felt so wretched.
"Don't you think you had better go home?" continued Miss Beck.