But Ruth watched Amy Gregg curiously.  She saw the smaller girl flush and pale and glance now and then toward the window.  Ruth jumped to a sudden conclusion.  Curly was somewhere outside that window on the roof!

CHAPTER XV

A DAWNING POSSIBILITY

“Well, the evening’s spoiled anyway,” yawned Helen, seeing Ann braiding her hair.  “I might as well stop, too,” and she closed her books with relief.

“It’s time small girls were on their way to the Land of Nod,” said the Western girl, taking the book from the resisting hand of Amy Gregg.  “Hullo! it’s time you were in bed, girlie, sure enough.  Holding the book upside down, no less!  What do you know about that, ladies?”

“Certainly she should go to bed,” Helen said sharply.  “We’re all sleepy.  Do hurry, child.”

“Speak for yourself, Helen,” snapped Amy.  “I don’t have to mind you, I hope.”

“You do if you want to get anywhere in this school—­and mind every other senior who is kind enough to notice you,” said Ann.  “You’ve not learned that lesson yet.”

“And I don’t believe you can teach me,” responded the younger girl, ready to quarrel with anybody.  “Give me back my book!”

Ruth went to her and put her arm around Amy’s neck.  “Don’t, dear, be so fractious,” she begged.  “We had all to go through a process of ‘fagging’ when we first came to Briarwood.  It is good for us—­part of the discipline.  I asked Mrs. Tellingham to let you come over here with us so that you really would not be put upon——­”

“I don’t thank you!” snapped Amy, ungratefully.  “I can look out for myself, I guess.  I always have.”

“You’re like the self-made man,” drawled Ann.  “You’ve made an awfully poor job of it!  You need a little discipline, my dear.”

“Not from you!” cried the other girl, her eyes flashing.

It took Ruth several minutes to quiet this sea of trouble.  It was half an hour before Amy cried herself to sleep on her couch.  The other girls had both crept into bed and called to Ruth sleepily to put out the light.  Ruth was not undressed; but she did as they requested.

Then she went to the window and opened it.  Nothing had been heard from above since Mrs. Smith had looked in at the chamber door.  But Ruth was sure the grim old woman was waiting at her grandson’s window, in the cold shed bedroom, ready for Curly when he came in.

And Ruth was sure, too, that the boy had not dropped to the ground. He was still on the roof.

“That was a tictac,” Ruth told herself.  She had heard Tom Cameron’s too many times to mistake the sound.  “And Amy was expecting it.  Curly had told her what he was going to do.  And now what will that reckless boy do, with his grandmother waiting for him and every other window in the house locked?”

“What are you doing there, Ruthie?” grumbled Ann.  “O-o-oh! it’s cold,” and she drew her comforter up around her shoulders and the next moment she was asleep.