ost
refreshing after the humiliations of the morning. "Perhaps we _are_
rather unusual," she allowed. "Rowena is beautiful when she is in a
good temper, and the boys are always bringing home prizes, and being
captains in their sports. Maud is stupid, but she has lovely hair, and
I, I'm not advanced in lessons--_your_ sort of lessons--but Miss Bruce
says I have a very original mind. When I'm grown up I don't intend to
stodge along in the dull, humdrum fashion most women do. I mean to Do
something. To Be something. To live for an Aim!"

Susan regarded her with serious eyes.

"What sort of aim?"

"Oh-h"--Dreda waved her arms with a sweeping movement--"I've not
decided. There's plenty of time. But I mean to have a Career, and make
my name known in the world."

"Don't you think," Susan asked tentatively, "that it is best to have a
definite aim and to prepare for it beforehand?"

"You talk as if you had an ambition yourself!"

"I have!" said Susan quietly.

"You mean to be celebrated like me?"

"I am going to be an author. I hope I shall be celebrated. I shall try
my best, but only time can show how I shall succeed."

"An author!" Dreda repeated disapprovingly. "_You_! How very odd! I
have thought of being an author myself, and we are so different. I
believe I could make up a very good story if I'd time. The only
difficult part would be writing it out. Fancy perhaps fifty chapters!
You'd get sick of them before you were half through, and have writers'
cramp, and all sorts of horriblenesses. We might collaborate, Susan!"

Susan smiled, but showed no sign of weakening.

"I don't think that would do. We should never agree about what we
wanted to say, but it would be delightful to read our stories aloud to
each other, and discuss them together. The first heroine I make shall
be exactly like you!"

"That's sweet of you. Begin at once--do! and read each chapter as it's
done."

Susan's smile was somewhat wistful. She looked in Dreda's face with
anxious eyes, as though waiting for a promise which must surely come,
but Dreda remained blankly unresponsive. It never occurred to her for a
moment that it could be possible to make a heroine out of Susan Webster!

CHAPTER TEN.

West End School was conducted on lines differing somewhat both from
those of the modern public school and the old polite finishing seminary
for young ladies. It accommodated in all about fifty pupils, and
although game