"Yes, and so are you. Aren't you Dorothy Greenfield, who was put up for the Lower School election?" "And lost it!" exclaimed Dorothy ruefully. "I don't believe I'll ever canvass again, whatever office is vacant. The thing wasn't managed fairly. You haven't told me your name yet." "Alison Clarke, though I'm called Birdie at home." "Do you live at Latchworth?" "Yes, at Lindenlea." "That pretty house on the hill? I always notice it from the train. Then you must have just come. It has been to let for two years." "We removed a month ago. We used to live at Leamstead." "How do you like the Coll.?" "I can't tell yet. I expect I shall like it better when I know the girls. I'm glad you go in by this train, because it's much jollier to have somebody to travel backwards and forwards with. Mother took me yesterday and brought me home, but of course she can't do that every day." Dorothy marched into school that morning feeling rather self-conscious. She could not be sure whether her story had been circulated or not, but she did not wish it to be referred to, nor did she want to enter into any explanations. She imagined that her classmates looked at her in rather a pitying manner. The bare idea put her on the defensive. Her pride could not endure pity, even for losing the Wardenship, so she kept aloof and spoke to nobody. It was easy enough to do this, since Hope Lawson was the heroine of the hour, and the girls, finding Dorothy rather cross and unsociable, left her to her own devices. At the mid-morning interval she took a solitary walk round the playground, and at one o'clock, instead of joining the rest of the day boarders in the gymnasium, she lingered behind in the classroom. "What's wrong with Dorothy Greenfield?" asked Ruth Harmon. "She's so grumpy, one can't get a word out of her." "Sulking because she missed the election, I suppose," said Val Barnett. "That's not like Dorothy. She flares up and gets into tantrums, but she doesn't sulk." "And she doesn't generally bear a grudge about things," added Grace Russell. "I believe I can guess," said Mavie Morris. "I heard yesterday that she isn't really Miss Sherbourne's niece at all; she was adopted when she was a baby, and she doesn't even know who her parents were." "Well, she can't help that." "Of course she can't; but you know Dorothy! She's as proud as Lucifer, and Agnes Lowe called her a waif and a nobody." "Agnes Lowe wants shaking." "Well, she didn't mean Dorothy to overhear her. She's very sorry about it." "I'm more sorry for Dorothy. So that's the reason she's looking so glum! Isn't she coming to the meeting?" "I don't know. She's up in the classroom." "Someone fetch her." "I'll go," said Mavie. "It's a shame to let her stay out of everything. She's as prickly as a hedgehog to-day, and will probably snap my head off, but I don't mind. She may have a temper, but she's one of the jolliest girls in the Form, all the same."