which stuck to them long after the society was
abandoned. It was most difficult to preserve the secret from the
little ones, who shared the playroom, but by instituting a series of
private signs and signals they managed to keep up the mystery and
obtain a great amount of enjoyment out of the matter. Brenda Prestbury
covered herself with glory by recalling the deaf-and-dumb alphabet,
the various letters of which she had learnt at home, and now taught to
the others, who were soon able to talk on their fingers, a rather slow
method of conversation, but delightful when they felt that nobody but
a member could understand. Unfortunately they carried their
accomplishment somewhat too far one day. Connie, seated at her drawing
board in the studio, began signalling an interesting remark to Linda,
who was at the opposite side of the table, and Linda was in the middle
of her reply when Mr. Dawson, the visiting master, suddenly cleared
his throat.

"I think I ought to tell you, young ladies," he said nervously, "that
I am very well acquainted with the deaf-and-dumb alphabet, having
taught the subject for several years at an institution for
deaf-mutes."

Connie went extremely red, as well she might, for she had asked Linda
where Mr. Dawson got the flower in his buttonhole, and if Miss Coleman
had given it to him? The girls never ventured after that to try
talking in the drawing class, though they did a little surreptitiously
during dancing.

The first grand meeting of the society was felt to be an occasion of
great importance. The playroom door was carefully shut, after
ascertaining that no one was in the passage, and Brenda even peeped
under the table and behind the window curtains to make quite sure that
none of the second class were concealed there. At last, considering
themselves secure, the magazine was produced by the Secretary, and
handed to the President, who, according to the rules, was to read it
aloud from beginning to end. It was written on sheets of paper torn
from exercise books, stitched together inside an old arithmetic cover,
the back of which had been adorned with scraps and transfers and
S.S.L.U. printed on a school label and gummed in the middle. The idea
of illustrations had to be abandoned, because nobody had any magazines
which they would spare to be cut up, neither did anybody's talent rise
to the pitch of original drawings; but on the whole that did not much
matter.

"It's stories we want, not pictures