"What?"
"Write a book that makes all the world smile."
"Not all the world," Lux said, her smile broadening. "I had a cousin who stopped half-way through. When I asked her why, she said: 'So unlikely. "
So Lucy went smiling away towards bed, glad that she was not going to catch that train tomorrow, and thinking about the plain Miss Lux who loved a beautiful sister and liked absurdity. As she turned into the long corridor of the E-wing she saw Beau Nash standing at the angle of the stairs at the far end, in the act of lifting a hand-bell to shoulder height, and in another second the wild yelling of it filled the wing. She stood where she was, her hands over her ears, while Beau laughed at her and swung the evil thing with a will. Lovely, she was, standing there with that instrument of torture in her hands.
"Is ringing the 'bedroom' bell the Head Girl's duty?" Lucy asked, as Beau at last ceased to swing.
"No, the Seniors take week-about; it just happens to be my week. Being well down the list alphabetically I don't have more than one week each term." She looked at Miss Pym and lowered her voice in mock-confidence. "I pretend to be glad about that-everyone thinks it a frightful bore to have to watch the clock-but I love making a row."
Yes, thought Lucy; no nerves and a body brimming with health; of course she would love the row. And then, almost automatically, wondered if it was not the row that she liked but the feeling of power in her hands. But no, she dismissed that thought; Nash was the one that life had been easy for; the one who had, all her life, had only to ask, or take, in order to have. She had no need of vicarious satisfactions; her life was one long satisfaction. She liked the wild clamour of the bell; that was all.
"Anyhow," Nash said, falling into step with her, "it isn't the 'bedroom bell. It's 'Lights Out. "
"I had no idea it was so late. Does that apply to me?"
"Of course not. Olympus does as it likes."