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erland. Isn't she lucky?" All the members of the third class had promised faithfully to correspond with one another, and Sylvia suggested that they should each keep a diary of their adventures, to be read aloud at the next meeting of the S.S.L.U., which had languished during the summer, but which they intended to take up with renewed vigour when the days began to close in once more. "Everybody must agree to send everybody else at least two picture postcards," said Linda, "and then we can compare them when we come back to school." "Yes, if one's mother will pay for them," said Connie, who had returned to the lawn. "Mine struck last holidays, and said eleven children all wanting stamps continually was ruining her, and we must buy our own. Postcards are a penny each, and they need halfpenny stamps, so it'll cost exactly one and ninepence to send two to every one of you. I can't possibly afford it! Not if I want any donkey rides or chocolates." The others laughed. The comfortable assurance that "Mother will pay", held by most boys and girls, had not caused them to think of the expense, and Connie's calculations were startling. "Well, of course, if you can't, you can't," said Linda, "and we shan't expect them. You may write a kind of round-robin letter and send it to me, and I'll send it to somebody else, who'll pass it on to the next. That'll only take you one stamp, and you must go without a pennyworth of chocolates." The guests were to arrive at half-past three o'clock, and the moment dinner was over, the girls hurried to their bedrooms for the very important ceremony of changing their dresses. Linda's thick, straight, brown locks had been wetted and plaited in the tightest possible braids the night before, to give it the required wave. Nina Forster had even tried the experiment of screwing hers up in curl papers; but the hard, round knobs had stuck into her head, and made her too uncomfortable to sleep, so, after tossing about uneasily for an hour, she could bear it no longer, and had pulled them out with a solemn vow to relinquish the idea of ringlets in the future. Marian, whose long beautiful auburn hair was generally brushed stiffly back from her face and worn in a neat pigtail, left it loose for once, and allowed Gwennie to tie it with two large bows of light-blue ribbon to match her sash; an alteration much appreciated by the girls, who declared they scarcely recognized her. Connie had little vanity,
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