It pleased Louie to take Mrs. Lovenant-Smith's question au pied de la lettre.
"I'm afraid my watch is in my cubicle. I could tell you in a moment," she said.
This the Lady-in-Charge saw fit to ignore. She drew her own watch from her belt.
"It is ten minutes past eleven," she said. "Students are not out of bed at ten minutes past eleven. Neither are candles burning. Miss Earle——"
But again Louie interposed. After all, it was rough on the Scholarship girl.
"Miss Earle came in only a moment ago to send us to bed," she affirmed, without a tremor.
"Then," said Mrs. Lovenant-Smith, turning to Louie, and perhaps feeling herself once more headed off, "you, Miss Causton, as a new student, are perhaps not yet familiar with the Rules. Be so good as to come to me at ten o'clock to-morrow morning and I will explain them to you."
Mrs. Lovenant-Smith did not make the discomfited rebels file out past her. She herself retired with dignity. Students do not linger in the box-room when it is made known that they are expected to go to bed at once.
But no sooner had the door closed on Mrs. Lovenant-Smith's back than the pent-up general breath escaped again in a fluttering exhalation. In it were awe, delight, homage.
"Oh, Causton!" somebody breathed. "You are a brick!"