't make too sure!" replied Linda, looking with apprehension as the
red jerseys of their rivals massed round the ball.

A familiar figure dashed forward, a hockey stick struck, and the ball
swept out to safety. Linda heaved a long sigh of relief.

"Winona is just A1," she murmured. "Hello! Good gracious! what's that
idiot doing?"

For Ellinor Cooper, whose arm was the strongest in the school, wielding
her hockey stick with all her force, had hit Winona across the shin.

Instantly there was a commotion. Winona, white with the agony of the
blow, leaned hard against Bessie Kirk, and clenched her fists to avoid
crying out.

"Are you hurt?"

"What's happened?"

"You've had a nasty knock!"

There was quite a crowd round Winona, and a chorus of sympathy.

"Put in a substitute!" urged Bessie. "You're not fit to go on!"

"No, no! I'm better now," panted their captain, with a wan little smile.
"I'll manage, thanks! Yes, really! Please don't worry yourselves about
me!"

The game recommenced and Winona, with a supreme effort, continued to
play. The pain was still acute, but she realized that on her presence or
absence depended victory or defeat. Without her, the courage of the team
would collapse. How she lived through the time she never knew.

Inspired by the heroic example of their captain, the girls were playing
for all they were worth. The score, which had been against them, was now
even. Time was almost up. Winona set her teeth. The ball seemed a kind
of star which she was following--Following anyhow. As the French say,
she "did her possible." The ball went spinning. Next minute she was
leaning against a goal-post, trembling with the violence of her effort,
while the High School hoorayed itself hoarse in the joy of the hard-won
victory.

"I say, old girl, were you really hurt?" asked Bessie anxiously. "You're
looking the color of chalk!"

"Never mind, it's over now! Yes, I am hurt. Give me your arm, and I'll
go back to the hostel."

"You're an absolute Joan of Arc to-day!" purred Bessie.

Winona, with a barked shin and bad bruises, limped for more than a week,
but she was the heroine of the school.

"I can't think how you ran, after that awful whack Ellinor Cooper gave
you," sympathized Marjorie.

"It was easier to run then than after my leg grew stiff," laughed
Winona. "I suppose it's the excitement that keeps one up. Don't make
such a fuss, we've all had hard knocks in our time. Agnes Smith got a
black