“Meet to gather?” asked Tommy.
“Yes,” replied Miss Lavinia, and Tommy’s difficulty remained.
Although Miss Lavinia had no time-table to refer to, all the children were kept busily occupied in one way or another from nine o’clock until twelve.
The first lesson was writing when for half-an-hour or so slate-pencils squeaked unremittingly. The older boys and girls copied from a book, but those who sat on the window-seats had a line set at the top of the slate, and this they wrote out eight times below. During the writing-lesson Miss Lavinia was able to run upstairs, make her bed and dust the rooms. On her return the writing was put on one side, and while some of the children did sums the younger ones read. Reading, of course, meant saying letters and putting together words of one syllable. Ruby Dark could go backwards from Z Y X to C B A without a pause!
The naughtiest girl in the school was Lizzie Wraggles. Lizzie sat on the window seat. She was only four and looked very shy, but Miss Lavinia said she was naughty and uncontrolled. It was always in the reading-lesson that difficulties arose for Lizzie would not read properly.
Tommy’s Ladies had left Draeth on a Saturday, and it was on the Monday morning following that Lizzie was naughtier and more uncontrolled than she had ever been before. On the Friday she had learned, after saying it many times over, that S-O spelled so. This morning, in reading a column of letters and little words, she had pronounced T-O as tow.
“Too,” corrected Miss Lavinia.
“S-O, so; T-O, tow,” murmured Lizzie in a low, sing-song voice.
The squeaking of slate pencils ceased, and all the older children stopped doing sums to listen.
Miss Lavinia became agitated: “Say T-O, tow, Lizzie,” she ordered sternly, and Lizzie said “T-O, tow.”