“For I can assure you,” continued Mrs. Case, “that if I were to place the entire matter before him, including your general deportment at the gymnasium and on the athletic field, I feel sure your parents would be requested to remove you from the school. Do you understand that?”
“I don’t know that I would be very sorry,” muttered the girl.
“You think you would not,” said Mrs. Case; “but it is not so. You are too old to be taken out of one school and put in another because of your deportment. Wherever you went that fact would follow you. It would be hard work for you to live down such a reputation, Hester.”
“I wish father would send me to a boarding-school, anyway.”
“And I doubt if that would help you any. You will not be advised, Hester. But you will learn yet that I speak the truth when I tell you that you will be neither happy, nor popular, wherever you go, unless you control your temper.”
“What do I care about those nasty girls on the Hill?” sputtered the butcher’s daughter. “They’re a lot of nobodies, if they are so stuck-up.”
“There is not a girl in your class, Hester, who puts on airs over you—or who attempts to,” said Mrs. Case, warmly. “And you know that is so. Deep in your heart, Hester, you know just where the trouble lies. Your lack of self-control and your envy are at the root of all your troubles in school and in athletics.”
Hester only pouted; but she made no reply.
“Now I am forced to remove you from this team where—if you would keep your temper—you could be of much use. You are a good player at basketball—one of the best in Central High. And we have to deny you the privilege of playing on the champion team because——”
“Just because the other girls don’t want me to play with them!” cried the girl, angrily.