on't you?" laughed Patsie, who never could resist a shot at Vivien. "I
should have thought it was just Dick, Tom and Harry you wanted to mix
with, and you're disgusted because it's only Maud, Gertie and Florrie!
Honestly, you'd be far happier in a boys' school. You'd better get your
mother to send you to one!"

"There's such a thing as co-education!" retorted Vivien.

"So there is!" chuckled Patsie.

She chuckled thoughtfully, for Vivien's remark had given her an idea.
She confided it to Audrey, who was rather a chum of hers.

"I'm a little fed up with the Duchess," she remarked, "and I want to
play a rag on her. I _must_ play a rag on somebody, for things have been
_so_ dull lately, and the school wants livening up. She said something
about co-education."

"What's co-education?" asked Audrey vaguely.

"Why, boys and girls going to school together. I believe they do it in
America, and at just two or three places in England. I'm going to
pretend that Miss Kingsley's taken it up, and that some boys are coming
here. Vivien would be so _fearfully_ excited. Oh! and I'll tell you
what"--Patsie's eyes danced--"the most topping notion's just come to me!
Let me whisper it!"

Audrey bent a wavy brown head with a pale pink hair ribbon to receive
the communication, then exploded into ripples of laughter.

"Gracie and Sybil! They've got short hair!" she hinnied. "Oh, it will be
an absolute stunt!"

The confederates did not publish their plans beforehand. Patsie was an
experienced joker, and knew that the point would be lost if any hint
were to leak out. It was noticeable, however, that in recreation time
she paraded round the gymnasium arm-in-arm with Gracie Tatham and Sybil
Snow, two tall Fifth Form girls. The fact was commented upon by Vivien
herself.

"Another of Patsie's sudden friendships!" she remarked. "She doesn't
generally have two going at the same time. What's come to her?"

"She's weighed down by her responsibility as a monitress, and is trying
to spread culture through the school," explained Audrey, with a grave
mouth, but an irrepressible twinkle in her eyes.

"Culture! Great Minerva! I'm sorry for the school if it takes Patsie as
a model!"

Vivien, like most of us, was a mixture of faults and virtues. One of
her strong points was punctuality, and on this Patsie counted. She was
nearly always one of the first to enter the cloak-room in the mornings.
She liked to look over her lessons and set her books i