"Oh, Pixie, I've such a smashing headache! You might tell! I was so looking forward to a rest this afternoon. It makes the week so dreadfully, dreadfully long when there are no holidays!" Flora's voice was full of tears, and Pixie's miserable glance, roving from one speaker to another, grew suddenly eager as it rested upon her, for she was skilled in the treatment of headaches, and was never more happy than when officiating as nurse. "I'll lend ye my smelling-bottle. It's awful strong! Ye said yourself the last time you smelt it ye forgot all about the pain. Will I run up this minute, and bring it for you?" "No, thank you!" Flora's tone was almost as cold as Kate's. "I don't want your loans. Smelling-bottles are no good to me if I have to rack my brains all the afternoon. You needn't pretend to be sorry, for if you were you could soon cure me. Come along, girls, let's go upstairs! It is no use talking to her any longer." The girls linked arms and filed to the door, only Lottie lingering behind to thrust her hand encouragingly through Pixie's arm. Kate, standing near, caught the whispered words of consolation. "You shall go to the circus in the holidays. I'll ask you to stay with me, and we will go somewhere nice every afternoon!"--and told herself reproachfully that Lottie was more forgiving than herself. "I don't feel in the least inclined to offer her treats, though I'm sorry for her all the same. She does look such a woe-begone little wretch! It's my belief she thought it was a good opportunity to examine the scent-bottle when we were all upstairs, and that she put it down too roughly or let it slip from her hands and hadn't the nerve to own up at once. I don't wonder she is afraid to confess now; I should be myself. You don't know what might happen--you might even be expelled! I don't believe Miss Phipps would keep a girl who was so mean as to make all the school suffer rather than face a scolding. There's one thing certain, I'm not going to have Pixie O'Shaughnessy fagging for me until this business is cleared up! I have tied my own hair bows before and can do them again, and I shall tell Flora and Ethel not to allow her in their cubicles either. If she is untruthful, how are we to know that she might not be dishonest next!" There is no truer proverb than that which says, "Give a dog a bad name and hang him!" for it is certain that when once we begin to harbour suspicion, a dozen little actions and coincidences arise to strengthen us in our convictions.