"I know it, thank you," replied Sylvia. "I had it with my governess at home." "Oh!" said Marian, looking rather disgusted. "But I don't suppose you took any of the notes, and Miss Arkwright explains it quite differently from anyone else. What sums are you at?" "Weights and measures," said Sylvia. "Why, we did those in the baby class! We're doing fractions now." "We've only just begun them," said Linda. "Don't bother about lessons, Marian. We've barely ten minutes before prep, and I want to show Sylvia her locker." The six children who, with Linda and Sylvia, made up Class III at Miss Kaye's, were all very much of an age. Hazel Prestbury was the eldest; a tall fair girl of twelve, with regular features and a quantity of pretty light hair which fell below her waist, and of which she was exceedingly proud. She could be rather clever when she troubled to work, but as that did not often happen she rarely stood high in her form, though she was well advanced in music, and played better than many girls of thirteen and fourteen. Marian Woodhouse, only an inch shorter, had a good complexion, and curly ruddy hair plaited in a thick pigtail. So far she had easily kept head of the class, for she was bright, and such a good guesser that she often contrived to make Miss Arkwright think she knew more than was really the case. She liked to manage other people, to take the lead, and keep everybody up to the mark, and was more of a favourite with the teachers than she was with her companions. There could have been no greater contrast to her than her sister Gwennie, a round, rosy dumpling of a girl, so gentle and quiet and unassuming that she scarcely ever seemed to have an opinion of her own, being content to follow Marian blindly, whom she considered the cleverest person in the whole world. The girls often called the pair "Voice and Echo", because poor Gwennie so faithfully upheld everything which her elder sister said, no matter whether it proved right or wrong. Connie Camden was the jolliest little romp imaginable. She was not at all pretty, and wore her lank, colourless brown hair cut short like a boy's, but she had frank grey eyes, and though she was continually getting into scrapes, her honest, straightforward ways atoned for much that was lacking in other respects. She was one of a large family, and had three sisters in the school, all with the same reputation for endless jokes and high spirits. Nina Forster, a graceful, delicate-looking child of ten, spoilt by her weak mouth and indecisive chin, was generally lost in adoration of some favourite among the bigger girls. Her friendships were of the briefest, but very hot while they lasted, and she seemed able to change her affections so easily from one object to another that she had a different idol nearly every week. Jessie Ellis, whose plain, freckled little face could look almost pretty when she smiled, had been placed in the third class solely because she was too big to