"Are you sure the mouse is gone?" she asked, evading the question.
"I think I see it there," exclaimed Moore. "Look out, Bessie!"
"Oh!" cried the girl, relapsing into fright and seizing hold of her companion for safety's sake. "Don't let the horrid thing come near me!"
Moore chuckled and released himself from her appealing grasp.
"Please be more respectful, Mistress Dyke," he said reprovingly. "I 'll not have you seizing hold of me like this. It is entirely too familiar treatment for a young unmarried man to submit to at such short notice and unchaperoned. Have you no bringing up at all? What do you suppose my mother would say if she thought I permitted you to take such liberties?"
"Oh, never mind your mother," said Bessie pettishly, deciding that she was in no particular danger at the present moment.
"That is nice advice to give a young lad," commented Moore, drawing a rose from his button-hole. "See, Bessie, I have brought you a posey, the last blossom on the bush. Some day, if I have the time, I shall write a poem on the subject."
"Thank you, Tom."
As she spoke, Bessie put the flower in a glass of water on the desk that already held a bunch of clover plucked for her by the grimy fingers of one of her pupils.
Dicky stood up and raised his hand.