"Here we are," said Tom Marshall, drawing up at the corner. "We'll see you safe to the gate—"
"Oh, no, thank you. It is only a step, and we have to climb the wall. Thank you, and goodnight," protested Marcia, her teeth chattering with cold and nervousness.
Not daring to speak aloud, the girls sped along, keeping close to the wall until they reached the low place where they could climb over without risking the opening of the gate. The basement window was still unlatched. Carefully they scrambled through, and finally stood on the floor—"Safe, and nobody saw us," exulted Marcia in a whisper.
And then, without warning the light flashed on, and the culprits stood revealed to the accusing eyes of Miss Charlton, the teacher on their hall.
For a long minute they faced each other, the girls too dismayed and startled to speak a word in their own behalf. At length Miss Charlton said slowly and very distinctly,
"I thought so. Marcia West and Rosalind Forrest, I shall report you absent without leave. You will both go to Miss Harland's office after chapel tomorrow morning. She will deal with you as she thinks best. Go to your rooms now. Goodnight!"
Thankful to be thus summarily dismissed, the girls scurried noiselessly up two long flights of stairs and reached Rosalind's room without meeting anyone. Every door was shut, the occupants of the rooms sleeping safely and sweetly. How passionately Rosalind envied them. If she were only safe in her own bed now, with no sense of wrongdoing to hound her, no punishment awaiting her.
"It's all your fault, Marcia," she sobbed, tearing her white dress in her hurry to get it off. "I wish I had never listened to you—"
"My fault! Well, I like that. You were very willing to listen at the time, it seems to me," returned Marcia crossly, pulling at the clasp of the pearl necklace so roughly in her irritation that it snapped, and the beautiful thing lay broken in her hand. "There! see what you made me do," she added angrily.
"I didn't," contradicted Rosalind, too exasperated to sympathize; and presently she was in bed, with the covers pulled over her head.