Janie spoke of home with the intense longing of a girl who is not naturally fond of the social side of life. She was out of her element at Chessington, and the strenuous bustle and stimulating whirl of the place, which began to mean so much to Honor, were repugnant to her quiet, reserved disposition. In every big school there are Janies, isolated characters not quite able to run the pace required by the inexorable code of public opinion, interesting to the one or two who may happen to discover their good points, but to the mass of their companions merely names and faces in class. Some of them do fine work in the world afterwards, yet the very qualities that help them to future success are not those to bring present popularity. They are not for the many, but for the few, and only show their best to an occasional friend whose sympathy can overstep the wall of shyness that fences them round.
With Honor alone Janie was at her ease, and she would chat away in their bedroom with a sprightliness that would have amazed the other members of St. Chad's, if they could have heard her. The two girls got on well together. Their opposite dispositions seemed to dovetail into one another, and so to cause little friction; and Miss Maitland, whose observant eyes noticed more than her pupils imagined, was well satisfied with the result of her experiment. Janie kept Honor up to the mark in the way of work; she would generally go over dates or difficult points in the lessons while they were dressing each morning, and it was chiefly owing to her efforts that Honor held a tolerably high place in her class. The latter often wished that she could have performed a like service for her friend in respect of athletics, but Janie was hopeless at physical sports, and endured them only under compulsion.
Every afternoon, from two o'clock till a quarter to four, all the girls were required to take part in organized games, under the direction of Miss Young, the gymnastic mistress. They were allowed their choice between cricket and tennis, but during the specified hours they must not be absent from the playing-fields, as this systematic outdoor exercise formed part of the ordinary course of the school. Now and then it was varied by a walk, and occasionally by an archery or croquet tournament; but these were reserved for insufferably hot days, and the time, as a rule, was devoted to more active pursuits. The cricket pitch lay to the west of the College, a splendid, level tract of ground, commanding a glorious prospect of low, undulating hills, cliffs bordering a shingly beach, and the long, blue stretch of the Channel beyond. All the healthy moorland and sea breezes seemed to blow there, filling the lungs with pure, fresh air, and well justifying Miss Cavendish's boast that Chessington was the most bracing place in the kingdom for growing girls. Even Janie's pale cheeks would take a tinge of pink as she ran, unwillingly enough, in chase of a ball; and the majority of the school would come in at four o'clock flushed and rosy, and very ready indeed for the piles of thick bread and butter that awaited them in the various dining-halls.