“I believe we’d just better train up for all we’re worth,” she said at the committee meeting.  “It’ll take ages to lick an eleven into shape.  What we want is to get a cricket atmosphere into the school.  You can’t develop these things all in a few weeks.  You’ve got to catch your kids young and teach them, before you get a school with a reputation.  I feel with all the games that we’re simply building foundations at present at the Seaton High.  This term especially is spade-work.  I’ll do all I can to get things going, but it will be the Games Captain who comes after me who’ll reap the reward.”

“Can’t you stay on another year?” suggested Patricia.

“Wish I could for some things, but it’s impossible.  No, I’ll do my bit this term, and then hand over the job to my successor.  As I said before, what we want now is a good start.”

Kirsty was a capital organizer.  She soon recognized a girl’s capacities, and she had a knack of inspiring enthusiasm even in apparent slackers.  She worked thoroughly hard herself, and insisted that everybody else did the same.  Her motto for the term was the athletic education of the rank and file.  It was really very self-sacrificing of her, for she might have gained far more credit by concentrating her energies on a few, but for the ultimate good of the school it was undoubtedly far and away the best policy to pursue.  The training of a number of recruits may not be as interesting as the polishing up of champions, but in time recruits become veterans, and a school in which the standard of the ordinary play is very high has a better general chance than one that depends on an occasional solitary star.  So even the little girls were strictly supervised in their practices, and both cricket and tennis showed healthy development.

The Governors and the head mistress were anxious that the games department should prosper, and gave every encouragement.  There were a larger number of tennis courts provided than fall to the share of most schools, and each form had its allotted times for play.  Athletics were indeed compulsory, every girl being required to take her due part, unless she were excused by a medical certificate.

Winona worked with the utmost enthusiasm.  As a Fifth Form girl she had, of course, to be rather humble towards the Sixth, but she felt that Kirsty approved of her.  It was never Kirsty’s way to praise, and she could be scathing in her remarks sometimes, but Winona did not mind criticism from her captain, and acted so well on all the advice given that she was making rapid strides.  In pursuance of Kirsty’s all-round training policy, she was not allowed to specialize in either tennis or cricket this summer, but to give equal energy to both.  So she practiced bowling under Hester King’s careful supervision, and played exciting sets while Clarice Nixon stood by to watch and score.

The games appealed to Winona more than any other part of the school curriculum.  She did fairly well now in her Form work, but she knew she could never be clever like Garnet, and that it was extremely unlikely that she would win laurels on her books.  She had promised Miss Bishop that she would try to do credit to the school in return for her scholarship, and to help to raise its athletic reputation seemed her most feasible method of success.