m lying just wherever you happen
to be, they might manage to stay there," suggested Mona Cameron, a tall
young lady, who sat near the window sewing, and who had more than once
been disturbed by Minnie's voyage of discovery.

"Oh, I've found two of them!" cried Minnie, emerging from beneath a
distant table, her hands black with dust, and herself nothing abashed by
Mona's rather sarcastic speech. "I wonder, now, whether I shall be able
to hunt up the others before Mab finishes her music!"

"O, Mabel Chartres is away," volunteered one of the other girls, "I
heard her come down fully ten minutes ago."

"That can't be," replied Minnie, "she must have come in here for her
things before she went away."

"Not at all, seeing she carried them up to the music-room with her that
she might save time; I heard her say she wanted away soon."

Minnie flew to the corner where Mabel's hat and jacket usually hung, and
sure enough both were gone. She sat down for a minute ready to cry with
disappointment, but recovering herself immediately, she choked back the
tears, and proceeded with the search for her books, though in a rather
more subdued manner, and with a great deal less bustle and
talkativeness. At length they were all collected from their various
hiding-places, and Minnie was ready to depart, but she seemed in no
hurry to go. She stood leaning against the desk, with a rather
irresolute look on her face, as if trying to make up her mind to
something. More than once she moved as if to go, but something seemed to
arrest her step.

At last she turned to where Mona Cameron still sat at work, and said in
a clear voice which could be distinctly heard by all the girls in the
room, "I _will_ try, Mona, to take your advice about putting my books
back in my desk; I know I'm horribly careless, and I thank you for
reminding me how I can mend it if I try."

All the girls looked up amazed--Mona herself as amazed as any and also a
little confused--but Minnie did not wait to see what effect her words
would produce, she walked straight out after she had spoken, and was not
a little astonished, and perhaps a little perturbed, to find Miss Elgin,
the English governess, in the dressing-room where she could not choose
but hear what had passed. Her face flushed, and she tried to hurry out
without attracting her notice, but Miss Elgin stopped her as she passed
the desk at which she sat, and drawing the bright face down to the level
of her own, kiss