overhear, but her chum chanced to move forward at that very moment and caught the unpleasant words. It made the only disagreeable note in her party. Marion shook hands warmly with Mrs. Hilton and thanked her for her hospitality as she said good-bye, but Lesbia, standing near, thought her politeness lacked a genuine ring. She could not forget the chance whisper she had overheard in the bedroom.

At the High School matters were going briskly this new term. Miss Tatham's scheme for self-expression found favour with the girls. It was so delightful to be able to choose your own lessons, if only for two afternoons during the week. There were tremendous debates about the various subjects on the list.

"It's a grizzly nuisance we mayn't do a bit of everything," mourned Marjorie Johns. "I want to paint and sing and act and learn wood-carving as well. Why can't we fit it all in?"

"Because the powers that be say there isn't time, my child. With your voice there's absolutely nothing for it but song-drama. It's Kismet."

"But I want to make my Christmas presents. Carving would be so useful."

"You'll have to make them at home. You're booked for song-drama, I tell you. Miss Bates has her eye on you."

"Oh, indeed! What about free choice then?"

"I think I shall go in for song-drama, it sounds ripping," lisped Ermie Hall, a short fat girl, whose speech, in spite of the persistent efforts of the elocution mistress, still clung to the "lal" of her childhood.

"You! Are we to have a chorus of corn-crakes?" hinnied Cissie Hales, who never spared her comments.

"We can choose what we like I suppose?" flared Ermie.

"No we can't altogether. There's to be a selection for song-drama. Theodora told me so. Miss Bates is to weed out the bad voices and pick a decent caste."

"A good thing too—for those who'll have to listen at Christmas," commented Aldora. "The audience ought to have some consideration shown to it."

"It would be hateful to choose song-drama and then be turned down," ventured Bernadine Molyneaux.

"Unthinkable," agreed Lesbia. "I know my voice is nothing, and I've not much ear for music (though I love it), so it's no use my playing out of tune in the orchestra. I'm going in hot and strong for Art on Tuesday afternoons. I shall put my name down for it. Here goes!"

"Are you absolutely sure?" warned Cissie, mock-tragically, as Lesbia, pencil in hand, approached the list. "Remember it's like getting married, and you can't change your mind. It's a case of 'say it now or hereafter for ever hold your peace!' When once you're wedded to the Arts class you may find you're 'mated to a clown' as Tennyson puts it. 'Be wise in time, O Lesbia mine!' Don't sacrifice your beautiful youth upon the Altar of Arts. Music woos you round the corner!"

"And would soon throw me overboard," laughed Lesbia. "Be thankful you'll have me as audience at Christmas. You want somebody, I suppose, to come and clap the performance. There now! My name's the first on the 'Altar of Arts' as you call it. Who else is going to have a good time on Tuesday afternoons in the studio?"

Lizzie Logan, Connie Blakeley, Aldora Dodson, and Laura Berkshaw at once followed Lesbia's lead, and Ermie Hall after a lingering look at the music list also signed her name under the heading of Art.

There still remained the choice of the intellectual hobby for Friday afternoons. Here Miss Tatham had allowed two subjects to be linked together, and from among them Lesbia selected 'Nature Study' and 'Antiquities'. She liked old houses and old customs, and the prospect of collecting the City's legends interested her.

Tuesday and Friday afternoons were now held to be the landmarks of the week. The school orchestra, which before had languished and almost winked out, took on a fresh lease of life. Violin cases and even violoncello cases appeared in the cloak-room, and from the sanctuary of Vb, turned into a temporary practice room, came weird sounds, somewhat rasping and scraping at first, but improving in quality as the term wore on. Those outside the locked door, though really rather thrilled, affected to mock at the music, and would ask facetiously if the wolves were howling, or where all the cats came from. The instrumentalists however, proud of their revived Society, took no notice of scoffing remarks and would reply loftily:

"Ah! Just you wait till Christmas and then you'll see."

"And in the meantime we hear, worse luck!" retorted their impudent critics. "Pity there isn't a sound-proof room for practising in this school."

Lesbia was immensely happy in the studio, where there were facilities for carrying out all sorts of fads. She had always longed to try stencilling and velvet painting, but could never before get on the right track of the processes. The new art teacher, Miss Joyce, was ready to give any explanations, and though the girls worked away "on their own" they could come to her as often as they liked with their difficulties. Lesbia complacently stencilled everything upon which it was possible to lay a pattern, work-bags, boxes, book-covers, and even a pinafore for Julie, though she knew to her sorrow that the first wash would remove the fruits of her labours, and Julie's pinafores never lasted clean more than a few hours. She longed for more scope, and had visions of covering the nursery walls at Denham Terrace with designs of Noah's Ark animals, insects, and butterflies.

"The children would love it," she explained to Minnie, "and if you'd only have a dado colourwashed over the wallpaper, I could stencil a row of creatures along the top, just on a level with the children's eyes. It would look as nice as one of those model nurseries we saw at the exhibition. Do let me, won't you?"

To her surprise Minnie hesitated, seemed to think the offer over, and refused it.

"The room was decorated only last spring, and I don't want to have the men in the house again," she declared.

"It doesn't need a man just to colourwash a dado," persisted Lesbia. "Why I believe Nurse could manage it."

"Nurse has plenty to do without colourwashing the nursery. Besides it's not worth while now, when——"

Minnie stopped abruptly, looking rather conscious.

"Not worth while? Not when the children would adore it?"

"I didn't mean that. I daresay they'd like it well enough."

"Then what did you mean?"

"Something I can't tell you. Don't bother, Lesbia, you can't know everything in this house. It's no use your putting a dado here. Perhaps some day, who knows?—your stencils may come in useful on some other walls."

Minnie spoke with a shade of embarrassment. Her young stepsister-in-law was gazing at her critically.

"How you love mysteries," remarked Lesbia. "All I can say is that, if you're thinking of removing, you'll find it a business to get another house unless you buy it, and Paul said this morning that nothing would induce him to buy property at the top tide of the market. The Morwoods have been trying to remove for two years, and can't hear of a house anywhere."

"The Morwoods' affairs have nothing to do with ours," remarked Minnie, closing the conversation firmly.

It was a blow to Lesbia not to be allowed to try her skill at decorating the nursery. She thought it highly unreasonable of Minnie. She stencilled some of the animals on pieces of paper and fastened them with drawing-pins on to the walls in a corner of the room, to show how nice the effect would be, but the children's inquisitive little fingers pulled at the edges of the paper and soon tore them down. In her annoyance she