They were joined by a new member, for
Nora and her husband came over, bringing their ten-weeks-old baby boy,
and Marjorie, Dona, and Joan felt suddenly quite grown-up in their new
capacity of "Auntie". Dona in especial was delighted with her wee
nephew.

"I've found out what I'm going to do when I leave school," she told
Marjorie rather shyly. "I shall go to help at a creche. When Winifrede
was reading out that 'News of Old Girls' I felt utterly miserable,
because I knew I could never do any of those things; a hospital makes me
sick, and I'd be scared to death to drive a motor ambulance. I thought
Winifrede would call me an utter slacker. But I could look after babies
in a creche while their mothers work at munitions. I should simply love
it. And it would be doing something for the war in a way, especially if
they were soldiers' children. I'm ever so much happier now I've thought
of it. I'm going to ask to take 'Hygiene' next term, because Gertie
Temple told me they learnt how to mix a baby's bottle."

"And I'm going to ask to take 'First Aid'," replied Marjorie, with equal
enthusiasm. "You have to pass your St. John's Ambulance before you can
be a V.A.D. I'll just love practising bandaging."

The girls went back to school with less reluctance than their mother had
expected. It was, of course, a wrench to leave home, and for Dona, at
any rate, the atmosphere was at first a little damp, but once installed
in their old quarters at Brackenfield they were caught in the train of
bustling young life, and cheered up. It is not easy to sit on your bed
and weep when your room-mates are telling you their holiday adventures,
singing comic songs, and passing round jokes. Also, tears were
unfashionable at Brackenfield, and any girl found shedding them was
liable to be branded as "Early Victorian", or, worse still, as a
"sentimental silly".

Marjorie happened to be the first arrival in Dormitory No. 9. She drew
the curtains of her cubicle and began to unpack, feeling rather glad to
have the place to herself for a while. When the next convoy of girls
arrived from the station, Miss Norton entered the room, escorting a
stranger.

"This is your cubicle," she explained hurriedly. "Your box will be
brought up presently, and then you can unpack, and put your clothes in
this wardrobe and these drawers. The bath-rooms are at the end of the
passage. Come downstairs when you hear the gong."

The house mistress, whose duties on the first