The little German garden was disappearing from Miriam's eyes.... It was cruel, cruel that she was not going to wear her blouses at home, at the tennis-club ... with Harriett.... It was all beginning again, after all--the spring and tennis and presently boating--things were going on ... the smash had not come ... why had she not stayed ... just one more spring? ... how silly and hurried she had been, and there at home in the garden lilac was quietly coming out and syringa and guelder roses and May and laburnum and ... everything ... and she had run away, proud of herself, despising them all, and had turned herself into Miss Henderson, ... and no one would ever know who she was.... Perhaps the blouses would make a difference--it must be extraordinary to have blouses.... Slommucky ... untidy and slommucky Lilla's mother had called them ... and perhaps they would not fit her.... One of the voices rose to a sawing like the shrill whir of wood being cut by machinery.... A derisive laugh broke into the strange sound. It was Fräulein Pfaff's laughter and was followed by her voice thinner and shriller and higher than the other. Miriam listened. What could be going on? ... both voices were almost screaming ... together ... one against the other ... it was like mad women.... A door broke open on a shriek. Miriam bounded to the schoolroom door and opened it in time to see Anna lurch, shouting and screaming, part way down the basement stairs. She turned, leaning with her back against the wall, her eyes half-closed, sawing with fists in the direction of Fräulein, who stood laughing in her doorway. After one glance Miriam recoiled. They had not seen her. "Ja," screamed Fräulein--"Sie können ihre paar Groschen haben!--Ihre paar Groschen! Ihre paar Groschen!" and then the two voices shrieked incoherently together until Fräulein's door slammed to and Anna's voice, shouting and swearing, died away towards the basement. 12 Miriam had crept back to the schoolroom window. She stood shivering, trying to forget the taunting words, and the cruel laughter. "You can have your ha'pence!" Poor Anna. Her poor wages. Her bony face.... Gertrude looked in. "I say, Henderson, come on down and help me pack up lunch. We're all going to Hoddenheim for the day, the whole family, come on." "For the day?" "The day, ja. Lily's restless." Miriam stood looking at her laughing face and listening to her hoarse, whispering voice. Gertrude turned and went downstairs. Miriam followed her, cold and sick and shivering, and presently glad to be her assistant as she bustled about the empty kitchen. Upstairs the other girls were getting ready for the outing. 13