"Why, sweetheart, this is the day of your school anniversary," said Aunt Barbara, as she and Dorothy sat at tea. "You ought to have been acting 'Queen of the Daffodils'."

"Don't talk of that, Auntie! I got Vera to take it instead."

Dorothy's eyes were full of tears.

"I'm sorry you were disappointed, darling."

"Auntie, it's not that; please don't misunderstand me. Ever since you were ill I've wanted to tell you that I know now what a nasty, ungrateful wretch I've been. You've been working and toiling for me all these years, and I took it just as a matter of course, and never thought how much you were giving up for me. I'm going to work for you now. I'm afraid I can't do much at first--with money, I mean--but I'll try my hardest at the Coll., and perhaps in a year or two I may be a help instead of a burden."

"A burden you have never been, child," said Miss Sherbourne. "If I had only got well a little sooner, we would have made you the costume. I sent the articles off the afternoon I was taken ill, and a cheque for them came a week ago."

"Then you must spend it on yourself, please. No, I'm glad the daffodil dress wasn't made. I should always have hated myself for having it."

"But you've missed the whole festival," regretted Aunt Barbara.

"Never mind, it's May Day here as well as at Avondale. Look at the lilac and the columbines, and this bowl of wallflowers! The air is so sweet and soft now, and there's a thrush's nest in the garden. All the harsh winds and the cold seem to be gone, and summer has come."

"Yes, summer has indeed come," said Aunt Barbara, gazing, not at the flowers, but at Dorothy's face, where a new, softened look had replaced the old frown of discontent.

CHAPTER XIV

Water Plantain

Dorothy returned to Avondale resolved to work doubly hard. There was certainly plenty to be done if she did not wish to fall behind in her Form. She had missed many of the lessons, and to recover the ground that she had lost meant studying the textbooks by herself, and trying to a.s.similate endless pages of arrears.

"Yet I must," she thought. "If I leave out the least sc.r.a.p, that's sure to be the very piece I shall get in the exam. I'm going over every single line--though it's cruel translating Virgil and learning Racine in such big doses. Never mind, Dorothy Greenfield, you've got to do it. I shan't let you off, however much you hate it."

Faithful to her determination, Dorothy set the alarum in her bedroom for a quarter to six, and had nearly an hour and a half's study each morning before Martha called her at 7.15. It was very tempting sometimes to turn over and go to sleep again; but she soon began to grow quite used to her early rising, and it seemed almost a shame to stay in bed when the sun was up, and the thrush was singing cheerily in the elder bush outside.

[Ill.u.s.tration: A NURSING EXPERIENCE]

The aim that Dorothy had in view was so ambitious that she hardly dared confess it even to herself. Every year a prize was given at Avondale called the William Scott Memorial. It was thus named after the founder of the College, who had left a sum of money in his will for the purpose.

It was awarded annually to the girl in any form who obtained the highest percentage of marks in the examinations. Though it was generally gained by members of the Sixth, it did not of necessity fall to them; every girl had an equal opportunity, for it went entirely by their relative scores, the object being to distinguish the pupil who had worked the best, irrespective of age.

"I believe it fell once to the Second; but the Sixth have had it for four years now," thought Dorothy. "Time for a new departure. I don't suppose I've the slightest ghost of a chance, but it's worth trying. I shan't mention my hopes to anybody, though--not even to Aunt Barbara--they're so remote."

Her increased efforts could not fail to win notice, however, at the College.

"Dorothy Greenfield, you're just swatting!" said Mavie Morris one day.

"I don't believe you'd a fault in your last German exercise, and you recited all that Virgil without one single slip. What's come over you?"

"Nothing," replied Dorothy, turning a little red. "You talk as if I'd been committing a crime."

"So you have. You're raising the general average of the standard, and that's not fair to the rest of the Form. When Pittie sees you with three 'excellents' to your name, she thinks I ought to do the same."

"Why can't you?"

"Why? You ask me why? Do you think I'm going to muddle my brains more than I can help, just in the middle of the tennis season? You little know Mavie Morris. No, Dorothy, I've a distinct grievance against you.

There you are now--actually surrept.i.tiously squinting at a book while I'm talking to you!"

"It's not a lesson book, at any rate; it's from the library," retorted Dorothy.

"Let me look at it. You humbug, it's a Manual of Botany! I call that lessons, in all conscience."

"Well, it has jolly coloured ill.u.s.trations," said Dorothy, trying to plead extenuating circ.u.mstances. "I want to hunt out the names of some specimens I've found. We have heaps of wild flowers growing in the lanes at Hurford."

"Whitewashed, but not exonerated! Your manual smacks too much of school for my taste. Why don't you take a leaf from me and practise tennis?"

"No luck for such a bad server as I am."

"Well, I didn't say you'd win the championship. I've no chance myself against Val and Margaret. Here's Alison; she'll reason with you. She isn't on the rising balance of the Form any more than I am myself.

Alison, tell Dorothy to quit this everlasting studying. Don't you agree with me that it makes it far harder for us slackers?"

Alison laughed good-naturedly. She never troubled much about her own lessons, for her mother was generally so anxious regarding her health, and so afraid of her overworking herself, that an hour's preparation sufficed for her home work--and, indeed, if she took more, Mrs. Clarke would threaten to complain to Miss Tempest.

"Yes, Dorothy's turning into quite an old bookworm," she replied. "She even insisted on looking over her Latin in the train this morning. I can't stand that, because I always like to talk. I don't get too much of Dorothy's company."

It was still a grievance to Alison that her mother would not sanction any closer intimacy with her friend. She had hoped, after the visit to Ringborough, that matters would be on a different footing, and that she would be allowed to introduce Dorothy at home and invite her frequently.

She could not understand why, for no apparently adequate reason, she must be debarred from her society. The fact that she was discouraged from being on too familiar terms had the effect of making her even more enthusiastic in her affection. There was a strong vein of obstinacy in her disposition, and if she once took up an idea she was apt to keep to it.

"Uncle David likes Dorothy," she argued. "He told Mother not to be ridiculous. I heard him say so. Perhaps in time I shall get my own way."

Mrs. Clarke, anxious not to thwart her darling more than was necessary, had many times proposed that some other cla.s.smate from Avondale should be asked to Lindenlea. But Alison had flatly refused.

"I can't possibly have Grace Russell or Ruth Harmon without inviting Dorothy. She'd think it most peculiar and unkind. No, Mother dearest, if I mayn't have her I'd rather not ask anybody at all."

"But you ought to have young companions, Birdie," protested Mrs. Clarke fretfully. "Your uncle was speaking to me on that very subject before he went to Scotland; and he is your guardian, so he is partly responsible for you. I believe I shall have to send you to a boarding school after all."

"No, no; I should be miserable, and so would you without me. I'd hate to leave the Coll. Don't worry, Motherkins, Uncle David shan't lecture you.

Naughty fellow! I won't be friends with him if he hints at boarding school again."

"I shall certainly talk it over with him when he returns from Lochaber,"

said Mrs. Clarke.

"When is he coming back? Is he really going to take a house near here, Mother?"

"I don't know. He may possibly settle in the South, in which case I should certainly decide to remove, and to go and live near him."

"Oh, please no! I don't want to leave Latchworth or the Coll.,"

protested Alison.

Alison was indeed absolutely happy at Avondale. For a day school the arrangements were perfect, and there were many features of the course there which suited her tastes. She liked the Ambulance Guild and the Tennis Club, and both the gymnasium and the laboratory were large and specially well equipped, far more so than in most boarding schools. This term, also, Miss Carter, the science mistress, had begun a very interesting series of Nature Study lessons, which included birds and insects, and made a special point of botany; and Alison, who adored flowers, threw herself into it heart and soul. It was the one subject over which she really gave herself much trouble. She collected specimens and pressed them, identified them from the big volumes of "Sowerby" in the library at Lindenlea, mounted them on sheets of cardboard, and printed their names neatly underneath.

"I shall have something to send to the Arts and Crafts Exhibition," she said, "though I'm no good at anything else."