"Of course!" the twins shrieked together. "And the boys opposite clapped, and she heard them and tried to pull down the blind, and her wrapper came open and she was wearing a chest-protector!" The interview with Miss Ashley was rather distressing, because she took from the start the altogether unexpected line of blaming Phyllis and Sylvia not for the breach of discipline, but for the wound they had inflicted upon Miss Primer. All that had seemed fine and honest and brave and noble collapsed immediately; it was impossible after Miss Ashley's words not to feel ashamed, and both the girls offered to beg Miss Primer's pardon. Miss Ashley said no more about the incident after this, though she took rather an unfair advantage of their chastened spirits by exacting a promise that they would in common with the rest of the school leaders set their faces against the encouragement of such behavior as that of the twins last night. The news from South Africa was so bad that Miss Primer's luxury of grief could scarcely have been heightened by Phyllis's and Sylvia's rudeness; however, she wept a few tears, patted their hands, and forgave them. A few days afterward she was granted the boon of another woe, which she shared with the whole school, in the news of Miss Lee's approaching marriage. Any wedding would have upset Miss Primer, but in this case the sorrow was rendered three times as poignant by the fact that Miss Lee was going to marry a soldier under orders for the front. This romantic accessory could not fail to thrill the girls, though it was not enough to compensate for the loss of their beloved Miss Lee. Rivalries between the Cecilias and Annabels were forever finished; several girls had been learning Beethoven's Pathetic Sonata and the amount of expression put into it would, they hoped, show Miss Lee the depth of their emotion when for the last time these frail fingers so lightly corrected their touch, when for the last time that delicate pencil inscribed her directions upon their music. "Of course the school will _never_ be the same without her," said Muriel. "I shall write home and ask if I can't take up Italian instead of music," said Dorothy. "Fancy playing duets with any one but Miss Lee," said Gwendyr. "The very idea makes me shudder." "Perhaps we shall have a music-master now," said Gladys. Whereupon everybody told her she was a heartless thing. Poor Gladys, who really loved Miss Lee as much as anybody, retired to her room and cried for the rest of the evening, until she was consoled by Enid, who pointed out that now she _must_ use her powder-puff.