The Naughtiest Girl in the School Read Free

like Elizabeth, who has no brothers, and not even a sister, it is like joining a large family of brothers and sisters and cousins, to go to a school like Whyteleafe!”
     “Oh, they’ll soon knock the corners off your Elizabeth,” smiled Miss Thomas. “Look-here comes our train. We have our carriages reserved for us, so I must find them. The boys have two carriages and the girls have three. Come along, girls, here’s our train!”
    Elizabeth was swept along with the others, She was pushed into a carriage with a big label on it, “Reserved for Whyteleafe School.”
    “Goodbye, Elizabeth; goodbye, dear!” cried Miss Scott. “Do your best!”
    “Goodbye,” said Elizabeth, suddenly feeling very small and lost, “I’ll soon be back!” she shouted.
    “Gracious!” said a tubby little girl next to her, “a term’s a long time, you know! Fancy saying you’ll soon be back!”

    “Well, I shall,” said Elizabeth, She was squashed in a heap by the tubby little girl and another girl on the other side, who was rather bony. She didn’t like it.  Elizabeth felt sure she would never, never learn who all the different girls were. She felt a little afraid of the big ones, and she was horrified to think there were boys at her school! Boys! Nasty, rough creatures-well. She’d show them that a girl could be rough too! The little girl sat silently as the train rattled on and on. The others chattered and talked and offered sweets round the carriage. Elizabeth shook her head when the sweets were offered to her.
    “Oh, come on, do have one!” said the tubby little girl, whose sweets they were. “A sweet would do you good-make you look a bit sweeter perhaps!” Everybody laughed. Elizabeth went red and hated the tubby little girl.
    “Ruth! You do say some funny things!” said a big girl opposite. “Don’t tease the poor little things she’s new.”
    “Well, so is Belinda, next to you,” said Ruth, “but she does at least say something when she’s spoken to!”
    “That will do, Ruth,” said Miss Thomas, seeing how red Elizabeth had gone. Ruth said no more, but the next time she offered her sweets round she did not offer them to Elizabeth.
    It was a long journey. Elizabeth was tired when at last the train drew up in a country station and the girls poured out of the carriages. The boys came to join them, and the children talked eagerly of all they had done in the holidays.
    “Come along now, quickly,” said Mr. Johns, pushing them out of the station gate. “The coach is waiting.”
    There was an enormous coach outside the station, labeled “Whyteleafe School,” The children took their places. Elizabeth found a place as far away as possible from the tubby little girl called Ruth; she didn’t like her one bit. She didn’t like Belinda either. She didn’t like anyone! They all stared at her too much! The coach set off with a loud clank and rumble. Round the corner it went, down a country lane, up a steep hill - and there was Whyteleafe School at the top! It was a beautiful building, like an old country house-which, indeed, it once had been. Its deep red wall s, green with creeper, glowed in the April sun. It had a broad flight of steps leading from the green lawns up to the school terrace.
    “Good old Whyteleafe!” said Ruth, pleased to see it. The coach swept round to the other side of the school, through a great archway, and up to the front door. The children jumped down and ran up the steps, shouting and laughing.
    Elizabeth found her hand taken by Miss Thomas, “Welcome to Whyteleafe, Elizabeth!” said the teacher kindly, smiling down at the sulky face, “I am sure you will do well here and be very happy with us all.”
    “I shan’t,” said naughty Elizabeth, and she pulled her hand away! It was certainly not a very good beginning.

CHAPTER 3
    Elizabeth makes a Bad Beginning
     
    It was half-past one by the time the children arrived and they were all hungry for their dinner, they were told to wash