“Good-bye, Ann. When I come back I’ll tell you all about school.” Sybil was dressed in her new navy-blue suit and sported the cherished brown stockings. Her hair was plaited and tied with a ribbon bow. She felt an experienced schoolgirl already.
“Good-bye, Miss Sybil, and if they treat you badly, you just come straight back ’ome; I ’ates them schools!” and Ann, whose knowledge was altogether derived from sensational and impossible story-books, wiped her eyes with her apron in anticipation of the troubles her pets were to endure.
“Pooh!” said Sybil; “school’s not like that! Just you _wait_! I may come back with heaps of prizes, and even _medals_ for all you know!”
Upstairs Gretta was clinging to her father, and wishing very hard indeed that she needn’t go. “Dad, if you want me, you’ll _promise_ to send for me?”
“I’ll promise,” said the doctor, with a trace of a smile at her words.
“And you’ll really change your boots when they’re wet, and not catch cold! I’ve told Ann always to warm your slippers, but she’s certain to forget after the first day; and you _will_ say if she makes the tea properly hot when you write, won’t you?”
Her last injunctions were broken in upon by Sybil, who burst upstairs in a frenzy of excitement. “The cab’s coming, and my elastic’s off my perfectly new hat! And it’s all pussy’s fault; she would play with me when I was saying good-bye to her, and I _had_ to snap it at her!”
In the excitement of putting the finishing touches to Sybil’s wardrobe the last few minutes quickly passed, and before they could realize that they were actually off, the children found themselves kissing their hands frantically to their father, who was standing on the fast receding platform waving his handkerchief. Really and truly they were off to school!
“Oh, I’m so glad we’re off,” said Sybil. She settled herself more comfortably into a corner of the carriage, then turned to see with amazement that her elder sister was _crying_--crying as though she were twelve years old instead of being fourteen, and a housekeeper at that!
“Why, Gretta!” exclaimed the surprised child in horror. Then the corners of her own mouth turned down, her eyes opened wider and wider, and in another moment they would certainly have overflowed in sympathy had not the older girl, with a mighty effort, pulled herself together.