Shortly after ten o'clock the school started, every Woodlander bearing her basket, containing sandwiches, two tartlets, an orange, and a small enamelled drinking-mug. There were to be no camp-fires to-day, so cold water from the stream would have to suffice, and would make tea all the more welcome when they returned home. It was quite a fine morning, with sudden gleams of sunshine that burst from the clouds and spread in long, slanting, golden rays over the valley; just the kind of sky the early masters of landscape painting loved to put in their pictures, with a background of neutral tint and a bright, scraped-out light in the foreground. The little solitary farms stood out white here and there against the green of the fields, the pine-trees on the hill-sides showed darkly in contrast to the bare larches. Cwm Dinas was inky purple to-day, but Penllwyd was capped with snow. Miss Bowes, who was not a good walker, had not ventured to join the expedition, but Miss Teddington strode along at the head of the party, chatting to some of the Sixth Form. "I'm sure she's wishing she were giving a Latin lesson instead," said Lizzie Lonsdale. "She looks rather grim." "Perhaps she's remembering she's a year older to-day," returned Beth Broadway. "How old is she, do you think?" giggled Addie Knighton. "That, my child, is a secret that will never be divulged. I dare say you'd like to know?" "I should, immensely." "Then you won't be gratified, unless you go to Somerset House and hunt her name up in the register of births. Even then you'd find it difficult, for you don't know her Christian name, only her initial." "Yes; she never will write more than 'M. Teddington' in anybody's birthday-book. M might stand for Mary or Martha or Margaret or Millicent or anything. Doesn't even Miss Bowes know?" "If she does she won't tell. It's a state-secret." "Well, never mind; we call her Teddie, and that will do." Many were the ingenious devices which the girls had adopted for trying to find out both Miss Teddington's Christian name and her age. They spoke of historic events that had happened before their parents had been born, fondly hoping she might betray some memory of them and commit herself. But she was not to be caught; she treated all events, however recent or old, from a purely impersonal standpoint, and left them still in the dark as to whether she was an infant in arms at the time or an adult able to enjoy the newspapers. On the subject of names she was indifferent, and would express no opinion on the relative merits of Mary, Martha, Margaret, Millicent, Marion, Muriel, Mona, or Maud. "It's either plain Mary, or something so fearfully fancy she won't own up to it," decided the girls.