Though the seniors might be scornful, indignant, or otherwise hostile towards the Tadpole Club, it certainly had the effect of increasing their own efforts and making them keep up their standards. A craze came over the school for physical fitness and efficiency, and the most persistent shirkers were forced by public opinion into exerting themselves. Miss Mitchell said little, but her hazel eyes saw everything that was going on. Her manner towards Merle, which had been rather off-hand, gradually softened, and though she showed her no special favour, she gave her, on one occasion, a word of praise. "You've shown me that you possess certain powers of organisation, and that you know how to use your influence," she remarked. And Merle, to whom Miss Mitchell's good opinion seemed almost the most important thing in the world, went about as if she were treading on air, and repeated the precious sentence to herself as proudly as if it were a patent of nobility. "She wouldn't notice me when I used to bring her flowers!" thought Merle. "It's only when I've done something for the school that she really cares. Some day, perhaps, I'll make her like me for myself!" CHAPTER XVII The Fourth of July Mavis and Merle went home to Bridge House feeling as if they had had a peep at the inner life of 'The Moorings.' They had seen fresh aspects of Miss Pollard and Miss Fanny, and though Merle could not honestly assure herself that she knew Miss Mitchell any better than before, she had at least the remembrance of a few words of approval. "I'm afraid she's one of those people whom you never do get to know very well!" ruminated Merle. "You go a little way, but never any further. We see the school side of her, and a quite jolly-all-round-to-everybody holiday afternoon side. I wonder what she's like to her private friends, and at home?" Miss Mitchell, however, was not at all disposed to make a confidante of any of her pupils, particularly of a girl who was not yet sixteen, and much preferred to preserve business-like relations and confine her conversation to school topics, than to give any details of her private life. She made it quite manifest that whoever wished to please her must do so on general and not individual grounds, so Merle accepted the inevitable, and worked very hard in class and at preparation, making a sudden burst of progress in her lessons that astonished herself even more than everybody else. It meant a certain amount of heroism to stick steadily to her books on glorious summer evenings, when even her own family tempted her to play tennis or go out in the car. Most of the other members of the Fifth form showed a marked slacking off in their homework, particularly the day-girls, whose preparation was not regulated. The Castletons, who had another wee baby brother at home, declared they found so much to do on their return that it was impossible to spend long over their lessons.