value in the eyes of your companions; you might, in brief,
march in the strictest order along the narrow road laid down for you by
these young lawgivers, keeping perfect step and time with them: yet of
what use were all your pains, if you could not marshal your thoughts
and feelings--the very realest part of you--in rank and file as well?
... if these persisted in escaping control?--Such was the question
which, about this time, began to present itself to Laura's mind.

It first took form on the day Miss Blount, the secretary, popped her
head in at the door and announced: "At half-past three, Class Two to
Number One."

Class Two was taking a lesson in elocution: that is to say Mr. Repton,
the visiting-master for this branch of study, was reading aloud, in a
sonorous voice, a chapter of HANDY ANDY. He underlined his points
heavily, and his hearers, like the self-conscious, emotionally shy
young colonials they were, felt half amused by, half-superior to the
histrionic display. They lounged in easy, ungraceful postures while he
read, reclining one against another, or sprawling forward over the
desks, their heads on their arms. It was the first hour after dinner,
when one's thoughts were sleepy and stupid, and Mr. Repton was not a
pattern disciplinarian; but the general abandonment of attitude had
another ground as well. It had to do with the shape of the master's
legs. These were the object of an enthusiastic admiration. They were
generally admitted to be the handsomest in the school, and those girls
were thought lucky who could get the best view of them beneath the
desk. Moreover, the rumour ran that Mr. Repton had once been an
actor--his very curly hair no doubt lent weight to the report--and
Class Two was fond of picturing the comely limbs in the tights of a
Hamlet or Othello. It also, of course, invented for him a lurid life
outside the College walls--notwithstanding the fact that he and his
sonsy wife sat opposite the boarders in church every Sunday morning,
the embodiment of the virtuous commonplace; and whenever he looked at a
pupil, every time he singled one of them out for special notice, he was
believed to have an ulterior motive, his words were construed into
meaning something they should not mean: so that the poor man was often
genuinely puzzled by the reception of his friendly overtures.--Such was
Class Two's youthful contribution to the romance of school life.

On this particular day, however, the sudden, s