one!"

"You don't possess half a guinea to buy one, my child!"

"But I do! I've got the money, and I'm going to get the racket I shall
go to Graham's to-morrow for it."

"I thought your savings box was empty again? How in the name of wonder
did you come by ten and sixpence?"

"Never you mind--I've got it, and that's the main point," replied
Lesbia, turning very pink.

"But how?"

"I shan't tell you! Leave me alone, Gwen! You've no right to pry into
my affairs. I never bother about yours. Let go my arm!" and Lesbia,
blushing even more furiously, wrenched herself free and fled towards
the house.

Lesbia seldom had secrets, so her conduct was the more astonishing.
Gwen gazed after her in great surprise, half inclined to follow her
and press the point; but remembering that her Latin for the next day
was still unprepared, she fetched her books instead, and buried the
remembrance of her sister's strange behaviour in Virgil and a
dictionary.

CHAPTER XX

A Day of Reckoning

Gwen went to school next morning in the jauntiest of spirits. She was
satisfied with the part she had played both in organizing the fete and
in helping to make it a success, and she fully expected approval from
headquarters.

"This will set me all right with Miss Roscoe now," she thought.
"She'll quite forgive me that business about Dick and the sweets on
the strength of a 'Rodenhurst Cot'. I think I've scored considerably."

When at eleven o'clock, therefore, Gwen received a summons from the
Principal, she was not at all dismayed, and presented herself in the
study with a smiling face. To her surprise, however, she was hardly
welcomed with the enthusiasm she expected. Miss Roscoe looked grave
and annoyed, and greeted her more as if she were a culprit than a
praiseworthy collector of money.

"Sit down, Gwen," she said coldly, motioning her pupil to a chair near
her desk. "You can unlock your satchel and go over your accounts with
me; then there is another matter that I wish to talk to you about
afterwards."

Feeling decidedly chilled, Gwen produced her key. Miss Roscoe emptied
the contents of the bag on to a tray, and proceeded to count the
various coins. She reckoned them twice over, frowned, consulted a
paper, then turned to Gwen.

"See how much you make it!" she said abruptly.

Gwen carefully went over the piles of half-crowns, florins, shillings,
and sixpences, and added them together.

"I get thirteen pounds seven and