g up her white glass of milk as she took it from the
tray and exactly imitating the housekeeper's voice.

"Platt Deutsch spricht-sie, ja?" Clara had said. It seemed as if there
were no more to be said about the housekeeper. At prayers when they
were all saying "Vater unser," she heard Jimmie murmur, "Ik kenne meine
Tasse."

8

Fraulein Pfaff came upstairs behind the girls and ordered silence as
they went to their rooms. "Hear, all, children," she said in German in
the quiet clear even tone with which she had just read prayers, "no one
to speak to her neighbour, no one to whisper or bustle, nor to-night to
brush her hair, but each to compose her mind and go quietly to her rest.
Thus acting the so great heat shall injure none of us and peaceful sleep
will come. Do you hear, children?"

Answering voices came from the bedrooms. She entered each room, shifting
screens, opening each window for a few moments, leaving each door wide.

"Each her little corner," she said in Miriam's room, "fresh water set
for the morning. The heavens are all round us, my little ones; have no
fear."

Gently sighing and moaning Ulrica moved about in her corner. Emma
dropped a slipper and muttered consolingly. Thankfully Miriam listened
to Fraulein's short, deprecating footsteps pacing up and down the
landing. She was safe from the dreadful challenge of conversation with
her pupils. She felt hemmed in in the stifling room with the landing
full of girls all round her. She wanted to push away her screen, push
up the hot white ceiling. She wished she could be safely upstairs with
Mademoiselle and the height of the candle-lit garret above her head. It
could not possibly be hotter up there than in this stifling room with
its draperies and furniture and gas.

Fraulein came in very soon and turned out the light with a formal
good-night greeting. For a while after all the lights were out, she
continued pacing up and down.

Across the landing someone began to sneeze rapidly sneeze after sneeze.
"Ach, die Millie!" muttered Emma sleepily. For several minutes the
sneezing went on. Sighs and impatient movements sounded here and there.
"Ruhig, Kinder, ruhig. Millie shall soon sleep peacefully as all."

9

Miriam could not remember hearing Fraulein Pfaff go away when she woke
in the darkness feeling unendurably oppressed. She flung her sheet aside
and turned her pillow over and pushed her frilled sleeves to her elbows.
How energetic I am,