s occupants to escape. They made full use of their
liberty, and at once began to scamper about, investigate the premises,
and enjoy themselves.

"What's that?" said Mona, sitting up in bed.

Dona did not reply. She pretended to be asleep already.

"It sounds like a mouse," volunteered Nellie Mason.

"Oh, good gracious! I hope it's not in the room."

The old saying, "as quiet as a mouse", is not always justified in solid
fact. On this occasion the two small intruders made as much noise as
tigers. They began to gnaw the skirting board, and the sound of their
sharp little teeth echoed through the room. Mona waxed quite hysterical.

"If it runs over my bed I shall shriek," she declared.

"Perhaps it's not really in the room, it's probably in the wainscot,"
suggested Beatrice Elliot.

"I tell you I heard it run across the floor. Oh, I say, there it is
again!"

The frolicsome pair continued their revels for some time, and kept the
girls wide awake. When Mona fell asleep at last it was with her head
buried under the bed-clothes. Very early in the morning Dona got up,
tempted her pets back with some cheese which she had brought from The
Tamarisks, and put the cage into her wardrobe again.

Directly after breakfast Mona went to Miss Jones, and on the plea that
her bed was so near the window that she constantly took cold and
suffered from toothache, begged leave to exchange quarters with Ailsa
Donald, who had a liking for draughts, and was willing to move out of
No. 2 into No. 5. Miss Jones was accommodating enough to grant
permission, and the two girls transferred their belongings without
delay.

"I wouldn't sleep another night in that dormitory for anything you could
offer me," confided Mona to her particular chum Kathleen Drummond. "I
simply can't tell you what I suffered. I'm very sensitive about mice. I
get it from my mother--neither of us can bear them."

"You might have set a trap," suggested Kathleen.

"But think of hearing it go off and catch the mouse! No, I never could
feel happy in No. 5 again. Miss Jones is an absolute darling to let me
change."

Dona's share in the matter was not suspected by anybody. Her plot had
succeeded admirably. Her only anxiety was what to do with the mice, for
she could not keep them as permanent tenants of her wardrobe. The risk
of discovery was great. Fortunately she managed to secure the good
offices of a friendly housemaid, who carried away the cage, and promised
to pre