"Something will have to be done!" said Nancy, darkly. She was the girl with the band over her front teeth. It was ugly, but fascinating; one felt constrained to look at it, and looking at it could not help noticing how curved and red were the lips, how darkly lashed the long grey eyes. Nancy was evidently a person to be reckoned with. She sat herself down by the fire, stretched out her feet to the blaze, and appeared to be lost in thought. Dreda longed to talk to her, to inquire what she meant by that mysterious "something," but the "Currant Buns" were clustering round her, regarding her with anxiously proprietary airs as if, having the honour of a personal acquaintance, it was their due to receive the first attention. Dreda felt quite like a celebrity, on the point of being interviewed by a trio of reporters; but as usual she preferred to play the part of questioner herself. "Were you doing prep when I came in? What classes are you taking to- day? I feel as if I've forgotten everything. One always does in the holidays, doesn't one? Such a bore having to grind through it all again. Seems such a waste of time." "Have you a bad memory? Miss Drake, our English governess, is especially clever at developing the powers of memory. And holiday tasks are so useful, too; don't you find them so? It is impossible to forget, if one has to study for an elaborate thesis." "The--what?" questioned Dreda blankly. "But whoever _does_ study in the holidays? I don't! If you did, they wouldn't be holidays. So stupid! Holidays are for rest and fun. Bad enough to have lessons for two- thirds of the year. One's brain must have _some_ rest!" She ended on quite an indignant note, and her companions stared at her with a mingling of admiration and dismay. Such a vivid bit of colouring had not been seen for many a long day in that neutral-tinted room. Yellow hair, pink cheeks, red lips, blue dress--she was positively dazzling to behold. The two younger Miss Websters appeared absorbed in admiration, but the eldest and cleverest-looking of the three pursed up her lips with an air of disapproval and said primly: "It depends upon one's _idea_ of rest, doesn't it? Leisure may mean only a time of amusement, but it's a rather poor conception of the word. The ancient Greeks understood by it a time of _congenial_ work, as distinguished from work which they were obliged to do. Their necessary work was undertaken in order that they might obtain a time of leisure, but when it came, instead of wasting it in foolish and passing amusement, they used it to strengthen their intellect and to store up ennobling thoughts." "How did they do that, pray?" Dreda put the question with the air of one launching a poser, but Mary Webster showed no signs of discomfiture. "They used to meet together in little companies, and discuss the deepest and most important topics of the day--" "I expect they gossiped horribly!" "And they watched the dramas--"