The full moon flooded the hall round which ran the galleries belonging
to the successive storeys, each crowded with girls in various designs
of night attire who hung over the oak balustrades to watch developments.

But they all leapt in unison, as though spurred into action by an
electric shock, when a deep voice boomed from the shadows round a green
baize door in the hall which led to the servants' quarters.

Then a distinct sigh of relief whistled softly through the entire house
when the electric lights suddenly blazed and the speaker was discovered
to be cook.

Cookie in an emerald green moirette petticoat and a somewhat _déclassé_
bedjacket, a tight knot of hair playing bob-cherry with her kindly
right blue eye, and a rolling-pin clutched truculently in her red right
hand.

Dear old Cookie who scolded and complained unceasingly, but who loved
the entire school with a love which took the substantial form of
delicious cakes, and buns, and jellies.

"H'I've come to h'investigate, Mum!" she called up. "Berglers or worse
got into Miss Jessica's room through them dratted French windies, I'll
be bound. Now just you stay where you are, Mum, an' I'll go an' see,
an' if I screams then come along. And I think a policeman might come
in handy, there may be one on the beat."

She waddled away to another green door always left open o' nights, and
which led to the wing reserved entirely for the girls of the Upper
Sixth; and where each one revelled in her own dainty separate bedroom.