Everybody got into bed that night with the happy feeling that boxes were packed and ready, and that to-morrow morning, when the last necessaries were popped in, they would only need to be strapped and labelled, and then the joyful opening would be at home. Most of the girls were too excited to eat much breakfast, but Miss Kaye, knowing a reaction would probably take place in the train, had provided packets of sandwiches and biscuits, and did not scold for once at the half-finished plates of porridge.
At ten o'clock cabs began to drive up to the door, and parties of chattering, laughing girls departed to the railway station under the care of Miss Barrett.
Sylvia had enquired anxiously some time ago if Mercy were to stay at school, having a secret hope that she might persuade her mother to ask her friend home with her, but May Spencer had already given an invitation which Miss Kaye had allowed Mercy to accept.
Linda's parents drove over to fetch her, so Sylvia had the pleasure of making their acquaintance. There was not time to do much more than shake hands, still it was nice to see the father and mother of whom Linda had spoken so often, and hear them express a wish that she should some day pay a visit to Craigwen.
Sylvia was to travel with Miss Coleman, who would pass through Crewe, where Mrs. Lindsay had arranged to meet her, and she had the four Camdens and Sadie and Elsie Thompson as companions for part of the way. The Camdens were welcomed at a wayside station by a jolly crew of brothers, who appeared to have reached home first, and the Thompsons were handed over at Chester to a gloomy-faced aunt, who did not look particularly pleased to receive them, and remarked at once how fast they had worn out their clothes.
"I wish I could have taken them home with me, poor little dears," said Miss Coleman afterwards in the train, "but my sister is ill, and could not do with any noise. Perhaps their aunt may brighten up more at Christmas, and remember that she too was once a child, and then we must see what can be managed for them at Easter."
At last came the longed-for arrival at Crewe, the anxious search among the crowd in the station, and the joyful sight of not only Sylvia's mother but her father also, hurrying along the platform. She hugged them both as if she had not seen them for years instead of eleven weeks.
"My precious child," exclaimed Mrs. Lindsay, "I declare you have grown, and are ever so much fatter, and you've quite a colour too!"
"School evidently agrees with you, Sylvia," said her father. "It's a good thing you went, isn't it?"
"It was quite different from what I thought it would be," Sylvia confided to her mother when they sat in the drawing-room together for a long talk after tea. "Miss Kaye isn't cross, she's lovely and kind; and even Miss Arkwright isn't bad, and I like Marian better than I did, and I just love Linda and Mercy. I tried to explain about Mercy in my letters, but I'm afraid you didn't exactly understand, so I'll have to tell it you over again. And Marian and I were both bracketed together top, and Miss Arkwright said we must be friends and not rivals, and I quite forgot the middle of "John Gilpin", and made a horrible mistake in my Christmas piece; but Miss Kaye said I might tell you that she thought I had done very well, but my report will come in a day or two, so then you can see everything for yourself."
Sylvia had a particularly happy holiday, and thought she enjoyed home twice as much with having been away from it for a whole term. Her father found time to label the specimens in her museum, and to show her how to develop her photographs and print them afterwards, and her mother gave up the afternoons specially to be with her. All her friends came to her New Year's party, and to her astonishment she found she got on perfectly well with the once-detested Fergusson boys, who now seemed hardly more lively than Connie or Stella Camden, and who did not tease her, since, as they described it, "she had left off putting on airs". Her experiences with the little ones at school made her quite motherly with Bab and Daisy Carson, and she enjoyed the games with Effie and May as much as they did.
"You said you wouldn't care to run about when you came back," they reminded her, "but you play more with us now than you did before."
"I believe Sylvia has learnt it as part of her lessons," said Aunt Louisa, who looked on with much approval, adding quietly to Mrs.
Lindsay: "The child is immensely improved. She is brighter and stronger and better in every way. I was sure Miss Kaye would soon work a change, and I think we may feel that so far our experiment has been a complete success."
CHAPTER XII
The Secret Society
School re-opened on January 18, and Sylvia found herself driving up to the well-known door with very different feelings from those she had experienced on her first arrival there. On the whole she was quite pleased to be back again, to meet all her friends, and compare notes about the holidays. There was one change in the third class which, however it might affect others, seemed to Sylvia a decided improvement. Hazel Prestbury had left. An aunt residing in Paris had offered to take her for a time to give her the opportunity of special study in French and music, and her parents had arranged for her to go at once, sending Brenda, a younger sister, to Heathercliffe House in her place. Brenda was a very different child from Hazel, and had soon sworn eternal friendship with Connie Camden, so that at last Sylvia felt she had her dear Linda absolutely and entirely to herself.
"I don't know how it is," said Nina one chilly February evening when the members of the third class were gathered round the high fireguard in the playroom, "there never seems half so much fun going on in the spring term. In the autumn we have Hallowe'en and the fifth of November and the Christmas party, and in the summer there are picnics and the shore, and the sports, and the prize-giving; but unless Miss Kaye takes us a long walk there isn't anything to look forward to now until Easter."
"And that's eleven whole weeks off," groaned Connie. "I wish it had come early this year."
"It wouldn't make any difference if it did," said Marian; "Miss Kaye keeps to the term. We should only have to spend Easter at school, and go home as usual in the middle of April."
"That would be horrid. Why should she?"
"Because it would make too long a summer term, and because she likes our holidays to be the same as those of the boys' schools."
"I hadn't thought of that. Of course it would be no fun to go home if Percy and Frank and Bertie and Godfrey weren't there. Still, I wish terms were a little shorter, or that something nice would happen." And Connie ruffled up her hair with both hands as an expression of her discontent.
"Couldn't we do something just amongst ourselves?" said Sylvia. "Not the whole school, but our class."
"There isn't anything new," said Brenda, "unless someone can invent a fresh game. We're getting tired of table croquet."
"I don't mean exactly a game. Suppose we were each to write a story, and then have a meeting to read them all out."
"Start a kind of magazine?" said Marian. "That's a good idea. We could put our tales together into an old exercise book, and perhaps paste pictures in for illustrations, and make up puzzles and competitions for the end."
"Oh yes, that would be lovely!" cried the others. "Like _Little Folks or The Girl's Realm_."
"But look here," said Linda. "The second class mustn't hear a word about it. They'd only make dreadful fun of us, and it will be ever so much nicer if we keep it a secret."
"Let us form a secret society, then," suggested Sylvia. "We'll pinch each others' little fingers, and vow we won't tell a soul in the school."
"How horridly inquisitive they'll be!" said Nina.
"All the more fun. We'll let them know that we're doing something, enough to make them wildly curious, but they shan't have a hint of what it is, and they'll imagine the most ridiculous things, and then we can just laugh at them and say they're quite wrong."
The girls agreed cordially with Sylvia's scheme, and the society was formed on the spot. There was a good deal of discussion as to a suitable name. Linda thought of "The Heathercliffe Magaziners", but Nina said that was tame, and that, moreover, "Magaziners" was not to be found in the dictionary of the English language. Connie considered "The 'Wouldn't you like to know?' Club" might be appropriate, but nobody approved of her title. At last Marian, who was fond of long, grand-sounding names, suggested "The Secret Society of Literary Undertakings", which was carried unanimously by the others. Marian was elected President and Sylvia Secretary, and the latter at once devoted a new notebook to writing the names of the members and the rules of the association.
"We must have rules," said Marian, "even if we don't always quite keep them. You'll have to hide the book away most carefully, Sylvia, for fear any of the second class get hold of it."
It took a long time to think of sufficiently strict and binding regulations, but at length they decided upon the following:--
1. This Society is to be called "The Secret Society of Literary Undertakings", and it can be known for short as the S.S.L.U.
2. Each member pledges herself that she will never tell a word of what goes on in it.
3. Any member who tells anything will never be spoken to again by the rest of the class.
4. There is to be a weekly magazine.
5. Every member must write something for it.
6. Even if a member says she cannot write anything, she will have to try.
7. If she does not try, she will be expelled from the society.
8. The meetings are to be held in the playroom after the fourth class has gone to bed.
9. Any member who is expelled will have to stay outside in the passage during the meetings.
10. All members are requested to write as clearly as they can.
11. The Secretary is to arrange the magazine.
12. The President is to read it out at the weekly meeting.
As Nina had prophesied, the S.S.L.U. aroused a good deal of curiosity among the second class, which, while it affected to look down upon the third, was nevertheless rather interested in what was going on there.
Being permitted to know the initials, though not the full name, the elder girls promptly added a G, and christened the members "The Slugs", a title which stuck to them long after the society was abandoned. It was most difficult to preserve the secret from the little ones, who shared the playroom, but by instituting a series of private signs and signals they managed to keep up the mystery and obtain a great amount of enjoyment out of the matter. Brenda Prestbury covered herself with glory by recalling the deaf-and-dumb alphabet, the various letters of which she had learnt at home, and now taught to the others, who were soon able to talk on their fingers, a rather slow method of conversation, but delightful when they felt that nobody but a member could understand. Unfortunately they carried their accomplishment somewhat too far one day. Connie, seated at her drawing board in the studio, began signalling an interesting remark to Linda, who was at the opposite side of the table, and Linda was in the middle of her reply when Mr. Dawson, the visiting master, suddenly cleared his throat.