“And who gave you authority to call such a meeting?” asked Linda icily.

“Why, I thought as Games Captain——­” began Winona, then she stopped, for the faces of the prefects expressed a righteous wrath that staggered her.

“It was a most unwarrantable liberty!” continued the head girl.  “As Games Captain you are responsible for the school play and for the fixtures, but you’re certainly not to take upon yourself a matter of this kind.  Why, you’re not even a prefect!  And no prefect would have dreamed of calling such a meeting on her own account without consulting her colleagues.”

“I—­thought—­there wasn’t time—­to ask,” stammered Winona, overcome with confusion.

“As a matter of fact the suggestion had already been placed before the prefects, and it was proposed to form an Old Girls’ Guild, which would include several branches, a Hockey Club being among the number.  An initial committee meeting is to be held next Thursday.  Margaret Howell was perfectly well aware of this, and could not understand why you should have stepped in and called a meeting at the hostel, thus forestalling our arrangements.”

“It’s the most abominable cheek I ever heard of!” burst out Agatha James.

“What were you dreaming of?” demanded Grace Olliver.

Poor Winona!  She suddenly saw her innocent, impulsive act in the light in which it must appear to the prefects.  It had never struck her that she was exceeding her authority, and that she ought to have referred the matter to the head of the school.  The urgency of getting the club started, so as to enter a Past v. Present in her list of fixtures, had been her uppermost thought.  She had indeed made a most terrible blunder.  The feeling against her was evidently one of general censure.  Even Garnet looked grave, and Bessie Kirk was bridling.  Linda’s manner was coldly official.  The stateliness of her speech was more cutting than Agatha’s explosive wrath.  Winona collapsed utterly, and groveled.

“I’m most fearfully sorry!” she apologized.  “Indeed I’d never have done it if I’d thought about it.  I was an utter idiot!  I really don’t know what possessed me!  I just sent off those cards in a hurry.  What shall I do?  There isn’t time to write back to everybody!”

“I think I can send messages to most of the girls, and if any turn up at the hostel this afternoon they must be told.”  Linda’s tone was slightly mollified.  “I hardly need impress upon you the necessity in future of referring everything to headquarters.  No school can be run on the basis of individual enterprise.”

Duly chastened, Winona left the prefects’ room.  She had the further annoyance in the afternoon of explaining the situation to several comers who turned up in answer to her invitation.  Notwithstanding this preliminary disturbance, the Old Girls’ Guild was started with thirty-five members on the roll.  A Hockey Club and a Dramatic Society were formed, both of which promised to have a flourishing existence, and Winona had the satisfaction of fixing a Past v. Present match for the following March.  The prefects were magnanimous enough to bear her no ill-will, so on the whole she came out of a very unpleasant dilemma much better than she expected.