Cassandra, with her face beaming as the sun, made a sort of figure-head for the smaller girls.  Presently three foundation girls entered the gates side by side and glanced up at her.  This trio formed perhaps the most objectionable set in the school.  One was called Kate Rourke; she was a girl of fifteen years of age, showily dressed, with flashing eyes, long earrings in her ears, false jewellery round her neck, and a smart, rather shabby hat, trimmed with a lot of flowers, placed at the back of her head.  Hanging on Kate’s arm might have been seen Hannah Johnson, in all respects that young lady’s double.  Clara Sawyer, a fair-haired little girl about fourteen, with a heavy fringe right down to her eyebrows, completed the trio.

They glanced at Cassandra, and then nodded to one another and joked and laughed.

“I have no doubt,” said Kate, “that Cassie will take her up.”

She said the word “Cassie” in a loud voice.  Cassandra heard her, but she took not the slightest notice.

“She is safe to,” continued Kate.  “Now, such a girl oughtn’t to be on the foundation at all.  If you only knew the snubbing she gave me yesterday.  I quite hate her, with all her pretty face and her mincing ways.”

“Never mind, Kitty,” said Hannah Johnson.  “She may snub you as much as she likes, but you have got me to cling on to.”

“And you’ve got me, too, Kitty,” said Clara Sawyer.  She snuggled close up to Kate and slipped her hand through her arm.

“Nasty thing!” said Hannah.  “I feel every word you say, Kate.  Do you know, I offered to walk home with her yesterday, and she said, ’No, I thank you; I prefer to walk home alone,’”

As Hannah made this speech she adopted the mincing tones which she supposed Ruth Craven had used.  The two other girls burst out laughing.

“Oh, do say what you are laughing about!” said another girl, running up to the group at this moment.  Her name was Rosy Myers.  “You always have a joke among you three, and I want to share it.  Do say—­do say!  I’ve got a lot of toffee in my pocket.”

“Hand it out, Rosy, and perhaps we’ll tell you,” said Kate.

Rose produced a packet of sticky sweetmeat, and a moment later the four were sucking peppermint toffee and making themselves thoroughly objectionable to their neighbors.

“But what about the girl—­the person you are laughing about?” asked Rose.

“Oh, it’s that stupid, tiresome Ruth Craven,” answered Hannah.  “Why, she’s nobody.  The governors and the mistress ought not to allow such a girl in the school.  It’s all very well to be on the foundation, but there are limits.  Why, her old grandfather kept nothing better than a huckster’s shop.  It doesn’t seem right that a girl of that sort should belong to this school, and then take airs.”

“But the question is,” said Cassandra suddenly, “does she take airs?”

The girls all stopped talking, and gazed up at Cassandra with astonishment in their faces.