for Brackenfield was to play the First Eleven of the Holcombe Ladies'
Club. They had rather a good reputation, and the game would probably be
a stiff tussle. Every Brackenfielder considered it her duty to be
present to watch the match and encourage the School Eleven.

Marjorie would have given worlds to evade her punishment task that
Saturday, but Mrs. Morrison's orders were as the laws of the Medes and
Persians that cannot be altered, so she was policed to the St. Elgiva's
sitting-room by Miss Norton, and provided with sheets of exercise paper
and a copy of Bacon's _Essays_.

"I shall expect it to be finished by tea-time," said the mistress
briefly. "If not, you will have to stay in again on Monday."

Marjorie frowned at the threat of further confinement, and settled
herself with rather aggressive slowness. She was in a pixy mood, and did
not mean to show any special haste in beginning her unwelcome work. Miss
Norton glared at her, but made no further remark, and with a glance at
the clock left the room. All the girls had already gone to the
hockey-field, and Marjorie had St. Elgiva's to herself. She opened the
book languidly, found Essay XIX, "Of Empire", and groaned.

"It'll take me the whole afternoon, strafe it all!" she muttered. "I
wish Francis Bacon had never existed! I wonder the Empress didn't tell
me to write an essay on Aeroplanes. If I drew them all round the edges
of the pages, I wonder what would happen? I'd love to do it, and put
Captain Devereux's picture at the end! I expect I'd get expelled if I
did. Oh dear! It's a weary world! I wish I were old enough to leave
school and drive a transport wagon. Have I got to stop here till I'm
eighteen? Another two years and a half, nearly! It gives me spasms to
think of it!"

She dipped her pen in the ink and copied:

"It is a miserable state of mind to have few things to desire, and many
things to fear."

"I agree with old Bacon," she commented. "Only I've got great heaps of
things to desire, and the one I want most at present is to go to the
hockey match. I wish his shade would come and help me! They didn't play
hockey in his days, so it would be a new experience for him. Francis
Bacon, I command you to give me a hand with your wretched essay, and
I'll take you to the match in return!"

A smart rap-tap on the window behind her made Marjorie start and turn
round in a hurry. Her invocation, however, had not called up the ghostly
countenance of the defunct