“Oh, give her time,” said Joyce Harrison, endeavouring to be comforting. “She might have been delayed in ever so many ways. Ten to one she’s found that the whole thing is no go, and she’s given it up, and is getting into her tennis things.”
“Not Robin,” said Betty O’Hara, quietly.
“Well, Robin can’t do everything she wants to, no matter how plucky she is,” Joyce responded. “And I really do hope she isn’t going to pull this off. She’s been in such an awful lot of rows already this term—Miss Stone’s getting madder and madder about her. I wish that silly ass of a Ruby hadn’t dared her to go raiding the sacred pantry.”
“So do I,” said Annette. “Everyone knows it isn’t safe to dare Robin to do anything. If you told her she wasn’t game to climb feet foremost up the electric-light pole, she’d be doing it in five minutes!”
“Ruby Bennett takes advantage of that,” Betty said hotly. “Half the scrapes that Robin has been in this term have had Ruby’s nasty little jeers at the bottom of them. And Robin’s such a dear old blind bat that she never sees it.”
“Well, Robin seems to like rows,” said Joyce. “But there will be an awful one if she’s caught this time.” She dropped her voice dramatically. “When Mother was down last week Miss Stone talked to her in her very stoniest manner about my being friends with Robin——said all sorts of horrid things about her wildness, and that she had a bad influence in the school. Poor old Mother was quite worried about it, until I made her see that Robin is just the straightest ever—she does mad things, but she wouldn’t tell a lie if she were burned alive!”
“I should just say she wouldn’t!” uttered Betty. “Robin a bad influence, indeed! I never heard such rubbish. Why, there isn’t a junior that wouldn’t lick her boots! Prigs like Lucy Armitage, of course——”
“Oh, old Lucy isn’t bad,” said Annette. “She’s rather overweighted by being a prefect, that’s all. She’s worried about Robin too, because Miss Stone told her she meant to make an example of her, next time she broke a rule. And Robin’s simply incapable of not breaking rules!”
“But she never does an underhand thing, as half of Miss Stone’s pets do,” said Betty. “Everyone knows that girls whose parents have money are all right in this school: Miss Stone keeps her telescope to her blind eye where they are concerned. If Robin’s mean old uncle were a bit more generous to her, she wouldn’t be Miss Stone’s black sheep. He must be a horrid old pig! Robin and her mother have a perfectly vile time at home. It’s no wonder the poor darling kicks over the traces when she gets away from him.” She fanned herself with her racquet. “I wish she’d come—it will be time for out set very soon.”
“Wonder if Miss Stone has caught her and locked her up,” conjectured Joyce, gloomily.