But, to himself, perhaps the principal said: “Meanwhile I will go out and stop the water from running down hill!” For the gossip having once begun to grow, there was no stopping it. Some of the girls had already begun to look askance at Hester when they passed her. Others whispered, and wondered, and surmised—and the wonder grew like the story of the man who ate the three black crows.
Hester, however, did not realize what all this meant. She was still angry with Nellie, and Bobby, and the others whom she considered had crossed her the previous afternoon. And especially was she angry with Mrs. Case, the physical instructor.
“I don’t much care if the stuff in the gymnasium was all cut up,” she declared, to her single confidant, Lily Pendleton.
“Oh, Hester! Don’t let them hear you say it!” cried her chum, who had heard some of the whispers against Hester, but had not dared repeat them to her chum for fear of an outbreak of the latter’s unfortunate temper.
“What do I care for ’em?” returned Hester, and went off by herself.
Hester Grimes was not entirely happy. She would not admit it in her own soul, but she was lonely. Even Lily was not always at her beck and call as she once had been. To tell the truth, Lily Pendleton seemed suddenly to have “a terrible crush” on Prettyman Sweet.
“And goodness only knows what she sees in that freak to want to walk with him,” muttered Hester, in retrospection.
Lily and Purt were pupils in the same dancing class and just at present dancing was “all the rage.” Hester did not care for dancing—not even for the folk dancing that Mrs. Case taught the girls of Central High. She liked more vigorous exercises. She played a sharp game of tennis, played hockey well, was a good walker and runner, and liked basketball as well as she liked anything.
“And here these Miss Smarties and Mrs. Case want to put me off the team,” thought Hester Grimes, walking down toward the athletic field and the gym. building after school that day.
There was little to go to the gym. for just now, with the fixtures cut up and broken. But Hester felt a curiosity to see the wreck. And there were other girls from Central High who seemed to feel the same. Some were ahead of her and some came after. They exclaimed and murmured and were angry or excited, as the case might be; but Hester mooned about in silence, and the only soul she spoke to in the building was Bill Jackway.