"Margaret!" said Kate. "Lottie!" cried Flora. "Clara!" cried Ethel; and they proceeded to argue the question between themselves. "Margaret is an angel. She is sweet to everyone. She never says an unkind word." "Lottie is so bright and clever. She is first in almost every single class." "Clara is so sensible. She doesn't make a fuss, and gush over everything, as Lottie does; but if she says she will be your friend, she keeps her word, and always tries to do you a good turn." "That's the way with meself," said Pixie modestly. "I'm the soft- heartedest creature! You three girls are me best friends because ye share me room, and I'll stick to you, whatever trouble ye're in. Ye need never be afraid to come to me, for the worse ye are, the better I'll like ye!" "Ho, ho, ho!" laughed Kate shrilly. Flora chuckled to herself in fat, good-natured fashion, and Ethel tossed her mane and said-- "I can quite believe it, but if you will excuse my saying so, I think the trouble is more likely to come to you than to us! If you go on behaving as you have done the last two days, you will be in need of friends yourself, my dear, so don't say I haven't warned you." "Behaving as I have done! Get into trouble meself!" echoed Pixie blankly. "And what for, please? What have I done? I promised Bridgie before I left that I would behave meself, and not disgrace the family, and I've kept me word. I've not been naughty once the whole time through." "Don't say `naughty,' child, as if you were a baby two years old! You may not have done anything wrong from your point of view, but you have broken half a dozen rules all the same. You planted yourself in front of the fire when the fifth-form girls were in the room, and never offered to give up your place even when Margaret herself came in. Not one of the old girls would think of doing such a thing. And you answered back when Miss Phipps spoke to you at tea--and told a story so loud that everyone could hear!" "And small blame to me if I did! It _was_ the dullest meal I ever sat through, and I thought I would do you a kindness by waking you up!" returned Pixie defiantly. She did not at all approve of Clara's attitude of fault-finding, and was up in arms at once in her own defence. "I have been brought up to make meself agreeable, and when Miss Phipps spoke to me, wasn't I obliged to give a civil answer? And I was cold when I sat before the fire. Are fifth-form girls colder than anyone else, that they must have all the heat?" "You know perfectly well what I mean, or if you don't, you are a stupid child, and you needn't fly into a temper when I tell you your mistakes. You want to get on, I suppose, and take a good place in the school, so you ought to be grateful to anyone who tries to keep you out of trouble." In the seclusion of her cubicle Pixie made a grimace, the reverse of appreciative, but she stifled her feelings in her desire for information, and asked the next question on her list.