"Who do you think will make all the arrangements and be captains of the teams? Boarders or day girls?" "Why, boarders, of course." "And who are the best players; who are going to win the goals?" "_We_ are!" "Of course, we are; everybody knows that! But the boarders would take all the credit, and talk about _their_ successes. The very idea makes me ill! Why should we play for _them_?" "Why, indeed?" "We're not obliged to. Our Saturdays are our own, and nobody can make us come and play hockey if we don't want. I vote we just say we won't join their old games club. Let's start a rival one of our own." "Yes, yes! Oh, do let us!" "We'll call it 'The Old Hawthorners' Hockey Club', and we'll hire our old ground and wear our old colours, and play matches of our own, and let those conceited Silversiders go to Jericho." Annie's daring suggestion met with a chorus of applause. The Hawthorners, made to feel unwelcome in their new school, clung desperately to their old traditions. They had had an excellent hockey record in past years, and felt confident that they could raise a team sufficiently strong to challenge their former rivals to matches. "Will you elect Gladys as secretary?" asked Annie. "That's all right. And Maggie as treasurer? Then give in your names, and bring your subscriptions to-morrow, and I'll go this very night and see about getting our old field. It belongs to Mr. Gardner, and my father knows him quite well, so I'm sure we shall manage it. If not, we'll hire another field." "Or play on the common," declared the girls as they crowded round Gladys Wilks, giving in their names. Adah Gartley had kept her word and written immediately to the secretary of Workington Ladies' College, who had replied by return of post, arranging a match for a date in November. She showed the letter with much satisfaction to the boarders after breakfast. "By the by, have those day girls paid their subscriptions yet to the Games Club?" she asked suddenly. "Not one of them," answered Isobel. "The blighters! And hockey begins to-morrow. Isn't it just like day girls? I must talk to them about it at eleven o'clock 'break'." The day girls were busy consuming packets of lunch when Adah, glass of milk and piece of bread and butter in hand, strolled amongst them, bent on her mission. "Look here, you slackers! D'you know you've never paid your half-crowns yet? Can't admit anybody to the hockey field who hasn't given in her subscription--that's one of the traditions of Silverside." "Is it?" said Annie Broadside casually. "I can't see that it concerns us." "You'll see to-morrow when you get to the field. A nice little disappointment it will be for you to find you're not allowed to play." Annie took a big bite of oatcake and gulped it. "Suppose we don't want to play?" "Not want to play!" Adah's expression was one of sheer incredulity.