ed, if it hadn't been for that hymn,' answered the
child, still barring the way obstinately. 'I can't help it if the hymn
made me feel funny without making you feel funny too, can I? I can't think
what there was about that hymn,' she added to herself reflectively; 'I
never remember noticing a hymn so much before.'

Miss Finlayson came up to them, and Jean fairly quaked. If there was a
rule that the head-mistress was strict about, it was the rule of silence
after prayers. Jean knew, for she had been unlucky enough to break it more
than once.

'I have changed your room, Jean,' said Miss Finlayson, calmly. 'Angela
will have yours for the rest of the term, and you are to sleep in number
fourteen, next door to Ruth Oliver. I have just told Angela, so you can
go straight to her old room now, and I will send up one of the servants
to move your things for the night. The rest can be done in the morning. By
the way,' she added, as she left them, 'you three may talk till the
lights are put out; for it seems that Barbara has something to say that
will not keep until to-morrow. Good-night.'

She walked away downstairs with a deliberate step; and the two children
were left standing together on the landing.

'Well, I never!' exclaimed Jean, staring after Miss Finlayson.

But Babs was less concerned with the peculiarities of the head-mistress
than with her own immediate business. 'How much longer are you going to be
before you shake hands?' she asked.

'Oh, that's all right,' answered Jean, awkwardly, and she at last put a
limp hand into the one Barbara was tired of pressing upon her. They
trotted along the passage side by side, Jean feeling a little overwhelmed
by the suddenness of the reconciliation, while Babs wondered what had
happened to make her so silent all at once. To her it seemed the most
natural thing in the world to be on good terms with the enemy whose
head you had just thumped, provided that you had apologised suitably
afterwards; and she chatted away cheerfully until Jean was obliged to
stifle her inclination to be dignified.

'I say,' said Babs, when they reached the gallery in the other wing of
the house and were hurrying round it to their rooms; 'shall I be punished
a lot for knocking you down this evening?'

Jean recovered some of her self-assurance. If she was to be denied the
pleasure, in future, of persecuting the new girl, there was no reason why
she should not still patronise her.

'Punished!' she ech