"Where have you been, you naughty, naughty girls? You're not to be trusted a minute out of my sight! I gave you permission to go straight to the bottom of the hill and back, and here you've been away more than half an hour! What were you doing in that garden? You had no right there! Come along this instant and walk before me, two and two. Miss Birks will have to hear about this. A nice report to take back of your afternoon's work at map drawing!" Map drawing! They had forgotten all about the maps. The girls looked at one another, conscience-stricken; and Deirdre, with an awful pang, realized that she had left her note-book on the mantelpiece of the dining-room. She had been disposed to titter before, but she felt now that the affair was no joking matter. "Miss Harding mustn't know we've been inside the house," she whispered to Gerda, with whom in the hurry of the moment she had paired off. "No one's likely to tell her, and she couldn't see us come out of the window from where she was standing," returned Gerda. "We shall get into trouble enough as it is. I didn't think Miss Harding would have cut up so rough about it. I say, just think of leaving those old letters all lying about! I got one--at least it's a scrap of one--with a lovely crest, a boar's head and a lot of stars--all in gold." "What!" gasped Gerda. "Did you say you found that on a letter?" "Well, it's a piece of a letter, anyway." "Oh, do let me see it!" "Is Miss Harding looking? Well, here it is. Be careful! She's got her eye on us! Oh, give it me back, quick!" Gerda had turned the scrap of paper over and was glancing at the writing on the other side. She reddened with annoyance as Deirdre snatched back her treasure. "Let me see it again!" she pleaded. "No, no; it's safe in my pocket! Better not run any risks." "You might give it to me. I'm collecting crests." "A likely idea! Do you think, if I wanted to part with it, I'd present it to you? No, I mean to keep it myself, thanks." "I'd buy it, if you like." "I don't sell my things." "Not if I offered something nice?" "Not for anything you'd offer me," returned Deirdre, whose temper was in a touchy condition, and her spirit of opposition thoroughly aroused. "We don't haggle over our things at the Dower House, whatever you may do in Germany." Gerda said no more at the time, but at night in their bedroom she returned once more to the subject. "You won't get it if you bother me to the end of the term," declared Deirdre, locking up the bone of contention in her jewel-case and putting the key in her pocket. "What do you want it for so particularly, Gerda?" asked Dulcie sharply. "Oh, nothing! Only a fancy of my own," replied Gerda, reddening with one of her sudden fits of blushing, as she turned to the dressing-table and began to comb her flaxen hair. CHAPTER VI Ragtime