Discussing the matter between themselves, the Ramsays decided that in this very point lay all the trouble. The Misses Pollard, in their foolish fondness for Opal, were making a grave mistake. They deliberately shut their eyes where she was concerned, and were always biased in her favour. "It's such an amateur little school," sighed Merle. "I don't mean the lessons, because those are really rather good, but the discipline is horribly slack." "Hardly exists," agreed Mavis. "Miss Fanny says easily, 'Now, get along, girls!', and a few try to work and the rest don't, and she never _makes_ them. I hate a slack teacher, however clever she is." "Everything is so casual," groused Merle. "There's no proper order even in answering questions. Opal raps out the answers if she knows them, and gets all the credit. It's most unfair. I should like to send Miss Fanny for a term to Whinburn High, and let her see how things are managed at other schools. It would be an eye-opener for her." "And for Opal too, if she could go as well. It would just do her all the good in the world." Evidently the only thing to be done was to keep a careful eye upon the delinquent, and bring her to book at the first opportunity that offered sufficient private evidence without taking the affair to the teacher's notice. Now it happened that one afternoon Gwen Williams left her French dictionary behind her in the classroom and went home without it. It was found in due course by Muriel Burnitt, who flung it into the school "pound", a lost-property basket from which objects could be redeemed by the payment of a penny into the missionary box. Both Mavis and Merle witnessed the placing of the book in this receptacle, though they gave no particular thought to the matter at the time. On the next French day Gwen came fussing into the classroom asking for her missing dictionary, and was much put out to find it was not forthcoming. "I _know_ I left it on the desk," she maintained. "So you did, and I popped it into the pound," said Muriel. "Pay your penny and you'll get it out. It's perfectly simple." But when Gwen walked over to the lost-property basket, and inspected its contents, she found an assortment of pencils, india-rubbers, and pen-holders, but certainly no dictionary. She was loud in her wrath, and the girls immediately round her began to offer comments and advice. "It was there yesterday." "I saw it myself." "Opal redeemed a penknife this morning." "You'd better ask her if she knows where it has gone." "Here she comes!"