Mr. Maynard laughed and watched the two girls hurry over to join him. A glance at his daughter’s face, however, told him that something had gone wrong, but Mrs. Wellington hoped to check the complaint at that moment. She suddenly turned her head, seemed to hear someone call, and then spoke to Polly.
“Come with me, dears, I believe we are wanted in the dressing rooms.”
Once out of ear-shot of Mr. Maynard, she whispered: “Oh, do not allow Eleanor to say one word to her father that will spoil everything. I will look into this matter myself after to-night. But so much depends on this play going smoothly, and how can it if some one causes an explosion?”
Polly felt sorry for poor Mrs. Wellington, for she really did have a hard life of it, trying to keep peace continually where so many girls were concerned. And she promised to try and calm Eleanor’s fury and determination to oust Elizabeth Dalken from the Wellington School for Young Ladies.
CHAPTER VI—THE NIGHT OF THE PLAY
Of the sixty odd pupils in Mrs. Wellington’s school, at least fifteen of them were to participate in the play. There was to be a Chorus of six girls, and a Ballet, besides the principals who also acted the drama to follow. Consequently the representative scholars not appearing on the stage, had been asked to act as ushers, and general supervisors of harmony.
Mr. Fabian and Mr. Maynard conducted Anne and her mother to the seats reserved for them, and soon the friends and families of the scholars filed in and took their seats. As the hall was generally used for other purposes, the floor was not graded, and the seats were not attached to the floor. They were ordinary wooden folding chairs to be piled up at the end of the performance.
The pianist and other music teachers from school formed the orchestra, and their opening number was rendered so well that an encore followed.
