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ority for this afternoon, and I mean to have my own way, so I give you warning. Start that dance instantly, and Ida and Peggie hold this rope." Instead of obeying, the Juniors crowded round Netta uttering protests and reproaches in a perfect chorus of mutiny. Gwen, who could not quite grasp the cause of the quarrel, made her way through a gap in the hedge and entered the large field. "What's all the shindy about?" she enquired. "You're like a set of wild Irishmen at a fair. I thought you were supposed to be rehearsing?" "How can we rehearse by ourselves?" "And without our leader?" "Netta won't conduct!" "She told us to go and dance by ourselves, while she practised her own jumping." "And she wanted to make Ida and Peggie hold the rope for her." "How can we do our morris dance without Ida and Peggie? It spoils the figures." "Netta!" gasped Gwen. "Did you actually mean to practise jumping instead of taking this rehearsal?" Netta shrugged her shoulders easily. "The kids know their steps so well, they can do the thing perfectly," she replied. "What was the good of wasting my time drilling them? I thought I'd make them of some use, and let them hold a rope for me. They're an ungrateful little set of sneaks--won't do a thing for their seniors!" "Why, I should think not, in this case, when you'd been specially told off by the Committee to superintend their dance. I sympathize with the kids. They've right on their side. It's you who are the sneak." "Oh! Am I indeed, Miss Gwen Gascoyne? Thank you for nothing. It's a pretty name to have called me, and I shan't forget it." "But it's true!" returned Gwen with warmth. "It's simply abominable behaviour to pretend to act dancing mistress and use the time for your own purposes. Why should these kids hold a rope for you?" "And why should you take me to task, I'd like to know? You're not a prefect." "I only wish I were." "No doubt you do!" sneered Netta. "You've been so stuck up since your Cot scheme was adopted, that you seem to imagine yourself as good as the head of the school." "Gwen, you take our rehearsal instead--we've wasted ten minutes or more over wrangling!" pleaded one of the Juniors. "I will, if Netta will let me." "Oh, I yield my place with pleasure to the all-important, all-necessary Gwen Gascoyne!" retorted Netta. "We humbler members of the Fifth don't get a look-in nowadays. But just let me give you one word of good advic
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