took the patient in hand with the air of one who is going to stand no
nonsense, and proclaimed her immediate intention of washing her.

Miss Lovelace, who had been languishing and half fainting upon the
couch, repudiated the necessity of such extreme measures, declaring that
water would only irritate the rash. Nurse insisted that such were the
doctor's orders and she must obey them. A violent struggle ensued
between herself and her patient, with the result that she completely
wiped off the eruption and revealed the shameless fraud practised by the
artful governess. At this interesting crisis Dr. Pillbox (evidently a
most attentive practitioner) arrived to pay a second visit. Miss
Lovelace, bursting into tears, begged the favour of an interview with
him alone. Nurse Harding reluctantly retired, and the youthful teacher,
falling on one knee in a picturesque cinema attitude of supplication,
threw herself on the doctor's mercy and revealed not only her ingenious
deception but the reason why she wanted a holiday. Dr. Pillbox was
kindness itself. He assured her he had at once detected the imposture
but promised to condone it. He pulled a notebook from his pocket and
wrote a medical certificate to the effect that she was incapable through
illness of performing her duties as teacher upon the following day, and
recommended a trip upon the river as the quickest cure for
re-establishing her health. It was received by his patient with an
exuberance of gratitude.

Then Nurse Harding and Mrs. Jones, who were hovering in the background
anxious to butt in, were called upon the platform, and all four
performers stood in a line and made bows of more or less graceful
quality.

As Lesbia, whose acknowledgement to the applause had been low and
sweeping, rose to her usual level her eyes encountered the amused and
interested gaze of no less a person than Miss Pratt. She started and
conveyed her unwelcome discovery to her fellow actresses. They retired
hastily in much embarrassment.

"I'd no idea _she_ was there!" fluttered Marion.

"When did she come?" asked Aldora.

"Why, she's been there the whole time," volunteered Betty Wroe, who was
helping as wardrobe woman; "didn't you see her sitting at the back?"

"I never dared to look at the audience," gasped Lesbia. "Oh! To think of
all the _awful_ things I said about teachers and Cupid, and all the rest
of it, with Miss Pratt actually sitting and listening. It gives me
spasms. And I went