said Jenny, and "Oo-er!" she cried, as she
upset the teapot all over the bed.

Then the bell had to be rung.

"Whoever heard of a bell-rope in such a place?" said Jenny, and pulled
it so hard that it broke. Then, of course, there was loud laughter, and
when Mrs. McMeikan came in again Jenny buried herself in the bedclothes
and Valerie had to explain what had happened.

"Eh, the wild wee lassie," said the landlady, and the high spirits of
the child, hidden by the patchwork quilt in the deep alcove, won the old
Scotswoman's heart, so that whatever mischief Jenny conceived and
executed under her roof was forgiven because she was a "bonnie wean, and
awfu' sma', she was thenkin', to be sent awa' oot tae airn her ain
living."

There was a rehearsal on Sunday because Madame Aldavini had to go back
on Sunday night to London. The four girls walked along the gray Glasgow
streets in the sound of the many footsteps of pious Presbyterian
worshipers, until they arrived at the stage door of the Court Theater.
Jenny asked, "Any letters for me?" in imitation of Valerie and Winnie.

"Any letters for Raeburn--for Pearl, I should say?"

Of course there was not so much as a postcard, but Jenny felt the
prouder for asking.

The rehearsal of "Jack and the Beanstalk" went off with the usual air of
incompleteness that characterizes the rehearsal of a pantomime. Jenny
found that the Aldavini Quartette were to be Jumping Beans; and Winnie
and Jenny and Valerie and Eileen jumped with a will and danced until
they shook the boards of the Court Theater's stage. Madame Aldavini went
back to London, having left many strict injunctions with the three older
girls never to let Jenny out of their keeping. But Jenny was not
ambitious to avoid their vigilance. It was necessary, indeed,
occasionally, to slap Eileen's face and teach her, but Winnie and
Valerie were darlings. Jenny had no desire to talk to men, and if lanky
youths with large tie-pins saluted her by the stage door, she passed on
with her nose as high as a church tower. And when, lured on by Jenny's
long brown legs and high-brown boots and trim blue sailor dress, they
ventured to remove the paper from their cuffs and follow in long-nosed,
fishy-eyed pursuit, Jenny would catch hold of Valerie's hand and swing
along in front of them as serenely cold as the Huntress Moon sailing
over the heads of Boeotian swineherds.

Those were jolly days in Glasgow, sweet secluded days of virginal
pastim