The rising gong found us dead to the world and only the telephone call, three knocks on the wall, aroused us.
"Trouble ahead!" whispered Mary Flannagan, "there was some one snooping around last night after we were all in bed."
"Well, we can prove an alibi. Who was it?" I chattered through the 'phone. I had jumped out of bed and was huddled in the closet behind Dum's dress. The window was still up and the heat turned off.
"You sound scared! Do you think they will catch us?"
"Scared! Not a bit of it! I am just cold. Of course, they won't catch us,—thanks to having abolished the honour system," and I hung up the receiver and commenced the Herculean task of getting Tweedles out of bed.
"Get up!" I urged, pulling the cover off of first one then the other. "I don't see what you would have done without a roommate. I'd like to know who would wake you up."
Dee put her head under the pillow like an ostrich trying to evade pursuit and Dum curled up in a little ball like a big caterpillar when you tickle him with a piece of grass.
"Girls! Get up! I tell you Mary says there is some mischief brewing. We had better get up and be down to breakfast in time with smiling morning faces or Miss Plympton will know who was up late feasting. Me for a cold bath!"
"Me, too!" tweedled the twins, coming to life very rapidly.
A cold plunge and vigorous rubbing took off all traces of the night's dissipations, and as a finishing touch we all of us let our hair hang down our backs in plaits. Since the summer we had with one accord turned up our hair. We felt that it added dignity to our years; but now was no time for dignity but for great simplicity and innocence.