"Yes, if they're done with intention for somebody else!" flared Raymonde. "But yours aren't! They're entirely for your own pride and vanity. Do you come and translate my Latin for me in those extra half-hours? Not a bit of it!"
"Oh, that wouldn't be fair!" Maudie's tone was of shocked virtue.
"It's more unfair to heap burdens on the rest of your Form."
"The fact is," burst out Aveline, "you're suffering from an over-developed conscience. You've got an abnormal appetite for work, and it ought to be checked. It isn't good for you. Promise us you won't write or learn a word out of prep. time."
Maudie shook her head sadly. Her grey eyes gleamed with the enthusiasm of the martyr spirit.
"I can't promise anything," she sighed. "Something within me urges me to work."
"Then something without you will have to put a stop to it," snapped Raymonde. "We've given you full and fair warning; so now you may look out for squalls."
When preparation was over, the girls were allowed to amuse themselves as they liked until supper. Most of them adjourned to the garden, for the evenings were getting longer and lighter every day, and the tennis courts were in quite fair condition. It was Maudie's habit to take a pensive stroll among the box-edged flower beds in the courtyard, and then repair to the class-room again to touch up her exercises. On this particular evening Raymonde, with a contingent of the Mystic Seven, lingered behind.
"We've just about ten minutes," she announced. "Old Maudie's as punctual as a clock. She'll walk five times round the sundial and twice to the gate."
"That girl's destined for the cloister," said Aveline pityingly. "She's evidently thirsting to live her life by rule. Mark my words, she'll eventually take the veil."
"No, she'll pass triumphantly through College and come out equal to a double-first or Senior Wrangler, or something swanky of that kind, and get made head mistress of a high school," prognosticated Ardiune.
"In the meantime, she won't swat any more to-night!" grinned Raymonde. "Wait for me here, girls; I've got to fetch something."
Raymonde performed her errand with lightning speed. She returned with a lump of soft substance in one hand, and a spirit-lamp and curling-tongs in the other. Her chums looked mystified.