"Or a circus rider!" added Hetty proudly.
"Well done, Gipsy!"
"Bravo!"
Miss Poppleton, however, did not share the popular enthusiasm, and received her adventurous pupil with a scolding instead of congratulations.
"You ought to be ashamed of yourself, Gipsy Latimer," she said sternly. "It's a mercy you were not killed. Understand once for all that I forbid such mad proceedings. If you have hurt your leg you had better go indoors. The sooner you learn that these are not Briarcroft ways, the better. This is a school for young ladies, not young hoydens!"
Slightly abashed, Gipsy beat a retreat to the house, where Miss Edith, who had been an agitated spectator from the linen-room window, bathed the wounded leg, put arnica on the bruises, and comforted the sufferer, while she proffered good advice.
"It was very naughty of you, you know, Gipsy dear!" she said in her kind-hearted, deprecating manner. "I don't know anything about riding, but it looked most dangerous, and of course, if Miss Poppleton said it was wrong, it was wrong. My sister is always right. Please remember that. Why, child, you're all trembling! I'll make you a cup of Bovril, and you must lie down on your bed for an hour. And promise me faithfully you'll never do such a foolish, silly, mad thing again! We want to hand you over to your father in good health when he comes to fetch you, and he'd blame us if you were hurt."
"He knows me only too well," twinkled Gipsy.
