he children were at her side in a moment,
beating and slapping at her arm, until they had inflicted almost as
much injury as a sting.

"It's fallen on the floor!" shrieked Madge. "No! it's up again! It's
back on the window! Where's the squasher?"

There was one well-established way of killing wasps in the schoolroom
at Beechgrove. This was with the heavy brass top of an old-fashioned
ink-bottle. Its size and shape were all that could be desired, and it
was familiarly alluded to as "the squasher". Even Miss Thompson when
in a hurry sometimes forgot to describe it as the top of an ink-bottle,
though she usually corrected herself afterwards.

At the present moment both Betty and John rushed to the table, and
began to fight vigorously for the possession of the much-coveted
instrument of destruction.

"Bring it quickly!" screamed Madge, who did not dare leave the window
for fear of losing sight of her prey. "Bring it here, I say! You
aren't going to squash it, you little sillies! I'm the eldest, so it's
my place!"

"You unfair thing! You squashed the last, so it's my turn!" shouted
John. And while he turned to hurl defiance at his elder sister, Betty
seized the opportunity to twitch the object of strife out of his hand
and run off with it.

Something perilously like a free-fight was in progress, when Miss
Thompson recovered her self-possession and sternly ordered the children
to return to their seats.

"And the wasp?" they cried. "It will get away, and make nests, and we
shall be stung, and have no fruit, and--"

"I will kill it myself," interrupted Miss Thompson, who now saw that
this was the only way to restore quiet.

"But why should you?" pleaded Madge. "You don't like squashing wasps,
and we do."

"That's just the reason I am going to do it myself," said Miss Thompson
resolutely. "Now go back to the table and find out the place in your
books."

"You are very unkind. Yes, very unkind," grumbled the twins; but they
did not dare to flatly disobey, any more than Madge, who left the
window scowling horribly, and expressing an audible hope that everybody
who liked wasps should be stung by wasps.

It was particularly annoying that Miss Thompson took no notice of this
amiable speech, but after crushing the wasp with as little interest as
she would have buttoned a glove, returned quietly to her seat, and
inquired:

"What was the most important event in the reign of Henry the Eighth?"
precisely a