“And then we must go straight to the theatre,” she said, “and stand outside the pit, and take our chance; but we will have time enough for that if we leave Merrifield by the quarter-to-six train.”

Kathleen noticed that evening that Alice watched her as she moved about the room; that Alice occasionally lifted her eyes and glanced at her when she sat down to read; and when she approached the tea-table and helped herself to tea and bread-and-butter and jam, Alice also kept up that gentle sort of espionage.  It annoyed Kathleen; she found herself watching for it.  She found herself getting red and annoyed when the calm, steadfast gaze of Alice’s brown eyes was fixed on her face.  Finally she said: 

“What are you doing?  Why do you stare at me?”

“Sorry,” replied Alice.  She bent over her book, and did not glance again at Kathleen.

By-and-by Kathleen went upstairs.  She went to their mutual room, and turned the key in the lock.

“I must get out of the window,” she said to herself.  “I can easily do it; it is but to swing on to that thick cord of ivy and I shall reach the ground without the slightest trouble.  The back-gate that leads into the garden is never locked, and the window I mean to emerge from looks into the garden.  I shall go off without anybody’s noticing me.”

Kathleen had to take a great deal of money with her.  If there were forty girls, their tickets would cost a good deal.  It is true they were to buy their own in the first instance, but Kathleen was to return them the money in the train.  Then the omnibuses they were to go on, the seats at the theatre, their supper of some sort must be paid for by the head of the society.

“I promised to frank them, and I must frank them,” thought the girl.

She slipped some sovereigns into her purse, tucked it for safety into the bosom of her dress, and then put on her hat and jacket.  Some instinct told the wild, ignorant child to dress quietly.  She put on her plainest hat and a little reefer coat which looked neat and substantial.  She was just drawing a pair of gloves on her hands when Alice was heard turning the handle of the door.

“Let me in at once, Kathleen,” she cried.

Kathleen did not reply at all for a moment; then she said in a sleepy, smothered sort of voice which seemed to proceed from the bed: 

“I have a splitting headache; don’t disturb me.”

“Very sorry,” answered Alice, “but I really must come in.”

Kathleen made no answer.  After a long pause, during which Alice once or twice felt the handle of the door again, the sound of her retreating footsteps was heard.

“Now is my time,” thought Kathleen.

To tell the truth, Alice was not at all taken in by Kathleen’s headache.

“She is very clever,” thought that young lady, “but she has tried that dodge on so often before that I am not going to be deceived by it now.”