"Now, I'm the drum. I stand here and beat. Rub-a-dub-dub! Rub-a-dub-dub--like that. Everybody must try to represent her instrument. Carita, you're a fiddle. Pretend to handle a bow. Isabel, you're a piano. Run your hands up and down as if you were playing a scale. "Watch me. I beat the drum. When I stop beating and imitate one of your instruments--suppose it is the fiddle--then you stop playing the fiddle, Carita, and begin to beat the drum. If you don't stop instantly, and begin to beat the drum before I call out fiddle, you have to stand up here and take my place. See?" Before five minutes had passed there was such hilarity in the room that it took several knocks at the door to bring a response. A thin angular form stood in the doorway, and a stern voice said: "Young ladies, I haf you to report to Miss North if not this noise stop instantly. _Instantly._ You understand? I speak not again!" "Oh, isn't she too exasperating," remarked Peggy Austin, one of the older girls, as Mary closed the door--a little quicker than might have been thought compatible with good manners. "I perfectly abominate her," Mary answered. "I am going to ask Miss North if Fraulein can't be removed from this hall. I don't think it's one bit fair for us to have her all the time. She's just too interfering." "It wouldn't do a particle of good to ask, Sozie," Peggy said. "Miss North caters to Fraulein, herself. She says she is the finest German teacher she ever saw. She imported her from Berlin at great expense and personal sacrifice to the Empire. The nation's been in mourning ever since she left!" Mary giggled, and the new girls looked interested. Peggy's solemn face carried conviction. "Goodness me," Carita exclaimed, "couldn't the Germans afford to keep her?" Peggy shook her head. "No," she declared, pretending to weep in her handkerchief, "it makes me cry to think of their disappointment--the poor things!" A gong sounded, but the girls lingered. "I want to see you after dinner, Carita," Blue Bonnet said as she left the room. "We go down to the gymnasium and dance a while, after dinner," Mary called out. "All right. I engage the first three dances then, Carita. Don't forget." Blue Bonnet went down to her room thoughtfully; a vision of those homesick children before her eyes. She wondered what people meant by sending such infants away from home. Why, there was one who seemed scarcely old enough to comb her own hair. All of a sudden she felt old--grown up; responsibility weighed on her--the responsibility of Carita. On her own hall she passed Mrs. White. "What a serious face," the teacher said. "I hope it is not homesickness." Blue Bonnet smiled brightly. "No, I think I've fought that all out." "That's good! Youth is not the time for tears." "But I have just come from a regular downpour." "It sounded like a downfall. I was in Madame de Cartier's room, just underneath. We thought the ceiling was coming through."