Miss Craigie was to come back on the day after Joey was restored to the ordinary privileges of Blue Dorm. Miss Conyngham sent for Joey after breakfast and mentioned the fact, asking very kindly if she would like to go and meet the four train, instead of joining her form "croc."

"Choose a companion," she said; "and, of course, I trust you to go and come back by the road, Jocelyn."

Joey coloured up. "It's ever so good of you, Miss Conyngham; of course I'll play fair. But please, is there ever a time when you could let us go on the Deeps?—for that tower is most frightfully interesting."

"The owner lives in London, I believe, and doesn't allow people to go over it," Miss Conyngham said. "It isn't supposed to be very safe now, for scrambling about in. But I will try to find out if he would have any objections to my taking a party of you girls, if you are so very keen."

"I think it would do that nervous chap good to see some company," urged Joey. "You can't think what his jumpiness was like, Miss Conyngham."

Miss Conyngham was as usual extremely busy, and could not wait to enter into the question.

"Which companion, Jocelyn?"

"Could I have two?" asked Joey, greatly daring.

Miss Conyngham considered. "I don't see any objection, if you will all behave very steadily. Remember the credit of Redlands is in your hands. Whom do you want?"

"Please, Gabrielle and Noreen."

Miss Conyngham smiled. "Very well. Are you three friends?"

Joey had become a good deal more certain since Cousin Greta asked that question.

"Rather, Miss Conyngham."

"I am glad to hear that. Gabrielle is a very good sort of friend to have, Jocelyn."

"And Noreen is a frightfully exciting one," Joey explained—and then remembered in time it would be better not to explain why.

She discovered that she had gone up in the opinion of the Lower School now that Miss Conyngham had actually picked her out to meet Miss Craigie. The mathematical mistress had many adorers, it appeared—and meeting trains could only be done by very special permission.

Ingrid Latimer herself accosted Joey in the mid-morning interval, demanding what she meant by going.

"I suppose Miss Conyngham thought I should like it," Joey said, slightly flustered by the question from one so great as the Senior Prefect.

"Rubbish! As though the Head would stop to think about that," Ingrid answered crushingly. "Think again, Kid. Is she an aunt of yours by any chance?"

"No—but we both live in Scotland, you see," Joey suggested.

"The cheek of the babe—as though Scotland were a private belonging of those two," burst in another huge Sixth Former, and Ingrid suddenly put both arms round Joey and lifted her on to a desk. "Now there you stay, until you have supplied a really adequate reason why you—merely an uppish new kid—should be granted the glorious privilege of meeting our Miss Craigie."

Joey considered. "Want the real reason?"

"Yes, and hurry up with it."

Joey grinned. "Then go on wanting it!"

The bell for Third Lesson rang violently.

"Oh, get off that desk and go to your classroom," ordered Ingrid. "You are the purple limit in assertiveness. I don't know why I put up with it."

"P'r'aps because you can't help it," suggested Joey, and then she scuttled past Ingrid at her best speed, and joined a gasping Noreen at the door.

"Are you whole and entire?" Noreen demanded. "My dear Joey, Ingrid will strew the floor with your remains if you don't look out. I'd never dare speak to her like that; I'd sooner cheek Miss Conyngham."

"I don't mind Ingrid," Joey boasted, vain-gloriously. "It's rather sport to see what she'll say next."

"No talking!" rapped out the Latin master, and Noreen began to gabble over her work to herself with great energy.

Joey felt fairly sure of hers, so devoted the spare two or three minutes, while Mr. Reade surveyed his notes, to drawing an extremely fancy portrait of herself and Ingrid walking down the Queen's Hall arm in arm, while portions of the Lower School cowered in doorways, or hurried obsequiously to right and left. This work of art was duly shown to Noreen, as soon as a flustered Barbara was put on to construe; Noreen retorted with a furious "Just you wait!"

Joey's assertiveness was kindly ignored in the afternoon, however, in view of the fact that she had won the privilege of meeting the train for her friends, and the three set out very cheerfully and a good ten minutes earlier than they need have done.

"How's the Professor?" Joey asked, as they passed the Lab, where she had spent those purgatorial minutes on her first arrival. It had been arranged by Miss Conyngham that she should not take chemistry till next term, in view of the host of bewildering new subjects that descend upon a girl fresh to school.

Noreen screwed up her eyes. "Well, his temper isn't on the mend. If he goes on being such a beast I shall cook up a pathetic letter to the pater and tell him I'm overworked."

"I should think he is," suggested Gabrielle quietly. "Have you noticed how pouchy he is under the eyes?—as though he didn't get enough sleep."

"Well, whatever is the matter with him, he's a holy terror to work with," Noreen declared unsympathetically. "I say, Gabrielle, I wish Joey did take stinks—her uppishness would probably drive him clean over the border, and we shouldn't have to bear with him any more."

"You've jolly well got to be uppish here if you don't want to be absolutely squashed," Joey explained. "I expect the Professor has war-strain; there was an English lady came to stay with us who simply couldn't stand Bingo blowing a trumpet anywhere near her because she had that, poor thing."

"P'r'aps he has a bad conscience, and is doing something beastly with his stinks," suggested Noreen. "I say, wouldn't it be a good thing to find out which it is? If it's war-strain—well, I'll bear his utter hatefulness and calling me 'fat-head' before the class, with cheerfulness; though I'm sure he's too old and too stout to have fought the Huns—still, he may have done munitions and used his chemistry that way...."

"Wasn't he here in the war?" asked Joey.

"Rather not. He only came last term, and nobody could stand him then. He's worse now. So if it's an evil conscience—I say, Joey, you old slacker, why don't you take stinks? You could help no end in the Sherlock Holmes business. Tell you what. I'll smuggle you in next time—Cicely Wren is in San with a throat—he won't notice who's there as long as he has his proper tale of jumpy victims."

"Let's," Joey said; but much to her surprise and disappointment, Gabrielle interfered quite decidedly.

"No, that wouldn't do. You mustn't, Joey. Don't try and get her to, Noreen."

"Don't see why not," grumbled Noreen, but Joey noticed that she yielded to the rather small Head of the Lower School with only that one murmur.

It was a dull, lowering afternoon, and the Round Tower, standing up before the three, looked gloomy and forbidding.

"Wonder if the jumpy young man is there now?" Joey remarked. The whole story of her adventure had been joyfully told last night in Blue Dorm, to the accompaniment of a most unwise amount of chocolates, and all Blue Dorm was as keen to explore the shaky tower as she was herself. And she and Gabrielle had shared a milk tumbler at Break, after which Gabrielle had been quite as much stirred up as the other three were.

"It strikes me," said Noreen, "that we are living in a mystery—probably lurid—and certainly topping. Why should Joey's man be so jumpy?" She paused dramatically.

"P'r'aps an air-raid bomb fell near him," suggested Joey.

"Egg! A bomb took most of my Granny's bed-room wall out one night, and she didn't turn a hair. English people don't."

"P'r'aps he's Belgian. He didn't seem quite English somehow."

"Well, if you meet him casually drop into French, and see how he takes it."

"Drop into French yourself," urged Joey; "you always find that so jolly easy in French conversation class."

"There! Listen to her, Gabrielle! Ever know anything so cheeky?—and I'm nearly a year older," complained Noreen.

Gabrielle was a peacemaker. "Oh, don't rag, you two. I want to think about the Professor. I wonder whether Miss Conyngham knows quite how—how cranky he is? He quite frightened a lot of the babies who were playing about near the door of the Lab, the other day, Rosie told me. He simply yelled at them, and no one ought to do that with babies. It wasn't as though they were trying to go in, or anything of that sort."

"I believe it's an evil conscience he's got," urged Noreen, with relish. "Why should he go for the babies otherwise? There's no sense in it."

"Unless it's like our war-strainy visitor and Bingo's trumpet," Joey said. "But she didn't go for him—she only asked frightfully nicely if he would mind blowing it farther off. The Professor is a pig to the kids; I've noticed it. Do you know Tiddles will never play that side of the house at all?"

"He hasn't gone and frightened poor little Tiddles, has he?" demanded Gabrielle indignantly.

"I don't know. I never asked. But she can't bear him," Joey said. "She won't come round that way, even with me."

Gabrielle ruffled up like an angry robin. "Well, that settles it. Of course, one can't go sneaking of him to Miss Conyngham when it may be war-strain, but I shall ask the Professor myself if he will mind being careful where the babies are concerned, poor little things."

Noreen and Joey gasped. "You won't? Why, he'll be furious."

"It's my job to look after things like that," Gabrielle said firmly. "It's the choice between pointing out quietly to him that babies mustn't be frightened, and telling Miss Conyngham what he's been doing—and I'm Head of the Lower. And nobody tells about unfairness and things like that at Coll; you just bear them, or alter them for yourself."

"Well, you're a sport, Gabrielle," Noreen remarked admiringly. "I wouldn't have the pluck."

"Of course I shall put it quite politely," Gabrielle told them. "Just say I am sure he would be most disturbed if he knew that he frightened the babies, and so on. I don't suppose he does it on purpose."

"I do," Noreen said stubbornly. "Don't you, Joey?"

"Haven't seen enough of him—but I do think he's a terror," Joey agreed; and then the station came in sight and they left off talking about the Professor and his ways, and talked of Miss Craigie instead.

"You'll have to buck up over your maths now, Joey," Gabrielle remarked. "She'll be so frightfully keen to see you go top, if she's a friend of yours."

"Joey is rather brainy over them," Noreen remarked kindly. "I sometimes fear she's going to turn into a swot after all."

"I'm not. I've been in quite as many rows for talking in maths class as you, anyhow," Joey retorted.

"Well, nobody talks when Miss Craigie takes maths," Gabrielle said, and Noreen agreed a trifle ruefully. "No, that's a true bill. You're a frightfully strenuous crowd in Scotland, Joey. Glad I wasn't born there."

"It's really rather funny we three should be friends," Joey remarked. "Gabrielle English, Noreen Irish, and I Scotch."

"We ought to make a pretty good alliance, don't you think?" said Gabrielle in her quiet way.

"The three Musketeers," suggested Noreen. "Let's stick together like they did—and I only wish we could go in for as many rows!"

At which pious aspiration both Joey and Gabrielle laughed, for Noreen was notorious at Redlands for the number and extent of her rows.

The train was rather late, but it came at last, and among the few people getting out at Mote Deeping, was a neat figure in a very well-cut coat and skirt, who was only about half Mr. Craigie's ungainly size, and not at all like him at first sight; though Joey came a little later on to recognise the familiar twinkle of the deep-set eyes and the kindly smile. Just then she only knew Miss Craigie by the ecstatic exclamation of Noreen and Gabrielle, "That's her!"

Miss Craigie shook hands with them, and she seemed to know who Joey was without a need of Gabrielle's polite introduction. At the earnest request of all the three, she consented to put all her luggage into one of the wheezy cabs and walk with them to Redlands.

She laid a hand on Joey's shoulder as they left the little station. "Well, how goes it?"

Joey liked her voice, with its touch of soft Scotch accent, and her eyes were very kind. She took a deep breath.

"I've messed up my quilt taking it on the roof, and Matron says it's a disgrace and ought to make me ashamed every time I go to bed. And I've starred a window, so it had to be mended; and I've got into a row with the Head for arriving home alone, and with Professor Trouville for tidying his old Lab——"

"That was my fault!" interrupted Noreen.

"And been turned out of French class once—but Maddy was fearfully decent after—and out of maths class twice for ragging...."

"I begin to feel quite anxious," Miss Craigie said tranquilly; but even Joey understood the truth of Noreen's statement, that there was no ragging when Miss Craigie taught.

With Noreen squeezing her arm affectionately on one side and Joey holding rather shyly to the other, Miss Craigie walked the two miles to Redlands, hearing much school news and asking many questions, in especial about the prospects of the big hockey match, Redlands v. Lincolnshire Ladies, which was always played towards the end of October.

"It's to be at Deeping Royal this year," Gabrielle said. "It was the Lincs Ladies' turn to choose, you see."

"Selfish pigs, they might have chosen somewhere nearer. Nine miles off; why, hardly any of us will be able to go and look on," grumbled Noreen.

"I think you will find that a certain number will go by train," Miss Craigie said in her quiet way. "You ought to be a poet, Noreen—you do love to magnify a grievance."

Noreen joined in the laugh against herself; she was always ready to do that.

"Well, I don't magnify the Stinks Professor, anyway, Miss Craigie; he has grown into such an ill-tempered beast, hasn't he, Gabby?"

Miss Craigie shook her head. "Unparliamentary language, Noreen; stop it, please."

Noreen stopped quite meekly—rather to Joey's disappointment. She would have liked to consult Miss Craigie about the Professor and his ways; however, if he wasn't to be talked about there was an end of it. She asked instead where Deeping Royal was.

"Away beyond the big reservoir—much nearer the Fossdyke Wash than we are," Noreen explained. "Gorgeous fields, if it's fine—but—when it's wet—Help! I wish they would play us at Redlands—we're always all right."

"And who will be allowed to go besides the Team?" Joey next asked anxiously.

"Oh, when we play outside and have to drive or go by train, each member of the Team can take a friend, and the Heads of the Upper and Lower School can take two. You'll take us, won't you, Gabrielle?" Noreen demanded breathlessly.

Joey gasped at the audacity of this suggestion, but Gabrielle answered composedly.

"You were the two I meant to ask, of course." Joey walked the rest of the way back treading on air, and refrained from swanking aggressively to either Gabrielle or Noreen when Miss Craigie invited her to come and help unpack after tea.

Afterwards, when several very big things had happened, she looked back on that blissful afternoon, and saw the result of that threefold friendship.