"Anne," pursued David, as they strolled down River Street together, "when I make my flying machine will you be afraid to take a sail with me?" "Never," replied Anne, "but I wish it had been made in time to carry me away from Miss Leece to-morrow morning." And Anne's words had more meaning than either of them realized at the time. Imagine the surprise and horror of the Hallowe'en party when, next morning, they discovered the effigy of Miss Leece planted right in front of the Girls' High School! And the teacher herself was the first to see the impious outrage. CHAPTER VIII MISS LEECE Yes, there stood the hideous, grotesque effigy just where her abductors had left her the night before, her green veil floating in the breezes. As a figure of fun and an object of ridicule, she might not have created more than a ripple with the faculty. But it was evident that Miss Leece's function, even in effigy, was to make trouble. And trouble was certainly brewing that memorable morning. The figure itself might never have been recognized, but a placard which had been pinned on the front of the old ulster left no room for doubt. Across it had been inscribed in large printed letters: "THE MOST UNPOPULAR TEACHER IN SCHOOL." No one dared take the effigy away for fear of being implicated. Everybody had seen it, both men and women professors and the boys and girls of the two schools. But it was not until Miss Thompson, the principal of the Girls' High School, had arrived that the figure was removed. "How could those boys have been so mean!" exclaimed Grace to her three friends just before the gong sounded. "They might have known what would happen." There was an ominous quiet in the various class rooms all morning; but nothing was said or done to indicate just when the storm would burst. When the first class in algebra met, Anne trembled with fear, but Miss Leece, in a robin's egg-blue dress, which offset the angry hue of her complexion, was apparently too angry to trust herself to look in the direction of the young girl and the lesson progressed without incident. However, she was only biding her time. "Miss Pierson," she said, toward the end of the lesson, in a voice so rasping as to make the girls fairly shiver, "go to the blackboard and demonstrate this problem." Then she read aloud in the same disagreeable voice, the following difficult problem: "'Train A starts from Chicago going thirty miles an hour. An hour later Train B starts from Chicago going thirty-five miles an hour. How far from Chicago will they be when Train B passes Train A?'" The girls looked up surprised. The problem was well in advance of what they had been studying and Miss Leece was really asking Anne to recite something she had not yet learned. Anne hardly knew how to reply to the terrible woman who stood glowering at her as if she would like to crush her to bits. "I'm sorry," said the girl. "I cannot." "Miss Nesbit," said the teacher, "will you demonstrate this problem?"