"We must take off our wonderful clothes, then," said Linda, beginning to untwist the scarves and put away the Turkish slippers. "Goodbye, dear sandalwood box! How I love the smell of you!" "Keep the box if you like," said Dr. Severn briefly, "and you, Sylvia, the bottle of attar. I don't want either. Come, children, I'm sorry to hurry you, but I don't want you to be caught in the rain. Get your hats, and Mr. Richards will see you home on his way to Craigwen." CHAPTER XVII The Sketching Class Linda and Sylvia had a great many experiences to relate to the other girls when they returned to Heathercliffe House, and as they were the only ones in the class who had been away for the few days, they were able to enjoy a position of much importance until their adventures were all told. Nothing particular seemed to have happened during their absence. Brenda had broken her bedroom jug, Connie had fallen against the mowing machine and her forehead was ornamented with large strips of sticking plaster which did not improve her personal appearance, and Dolly had locked the door of the book cupboard in the Kindergarten room and lost the key, much to Miss Coleman's wrath. Otherwise there were no events worth chronicling. "Unless you'd like to hear that I've made a fresh copy of my Greek history notes," said Marian. "They're most beautifully neat, and underlined with red ink. I'm sure Miss Kaye'll say they're better than anybody else's." But as both Linda and Sylvia declared that did not interest them in the least, Marian's piece of information fell rather flat. All the girls seemed to find it a little difficult to settle into harness again after the short holiday. The weather was warm, and in spite of open windows the schoolrooms were apt to feel close and stuffy. Miss Arkwright tried the plan of holding her class under the big hawthorn in the garden, but she found that a bird singing in the tree, a bumble bee settling on a flower, or a butterfly flitting across the lawn was enough to put dates and rivers completely out of her pupils' minds, and to wipe even their best-known facts from their memories, so she did not repeat her experiment. "In our grandmothers' days schools always had their holidays in June," said Sylvia, yawning, as she idly picked the heads off the daisies on the lawn one afternoon. "They broke up just when the hot weather begins, and then they had all the lovely time when the evenings are so long and you can be out-of-doors until bedtime, and the strawberries are ripe, and they're cutting the hay. I think it was far nicer. We don't break up till the 31st of July." "Yes, but remember they'd have the whole of August at school," said Marian. "Think of having to come back just at the time when everyone's going away now to the seaside. And what an enormous term it would make till Christmas!" "They had quarters then," said Sylvia, "and a little holiday at Michaelmas, like the Easter one."