CHAPTER NINE: TWINS INDEED

"Snow!" Every girl looked up as Janet spoke, and a ripple of laughter ran around the room.

"Janet, did you say that?" -- Miss Baxter looked over her thick lens glasses and focused her pale blue eyes on Phyllis's twin. An expectant silence fell over the room.

"Yes, Miss Baxter," -- Janet rose to answer.

Miss Baxter tapped the desk with her long and callous forefinger.

"Phyllis, I am quite aware that you are answering, and I might add that this is not the place to practice silly jokes."

A sudden, though quickly suppressed, snort came from behind Sally's desk, and even Muriel, sitting beside Phyllis, giggled.

"Janet, will you please stand up and speak for yourself?" Miss Baxter peered a little over the desk, and her face set in hard, uncompromising lines. 

A month had passed since the last chapter, and Janet had found a very particular place in the school for herself. Once on the right road it had been only a matter of a few days before the girls accepted her, and only a matter of weeks before she was one of the leading members of her class. Her quiet humor and downright frankness made her a welcome addition to the school, as Sally had prophesied.

She and Phyllis had discovered how easy it was to pass for each other, and further to confuse people they began to dress alike. Miss Gwynne, the history teacher, had made a mistake in their identity in class one day and had laughed about it later to the rest of the teachers. Only Miss Baxter refused to find the story amusing. She had called it impertinence, and then and there made up her mind that the same trick should never be played on her.

This morning her near-sightedness had confused her, but she was certain that they were trying to trick her and she would have none of it.

"But I am Janet, and I am standing up." Janet had caught some of Daphne's drawl and used it when she remembered to. 

Miss Baxter smiled coldly but triumphantly.

"Very well, if you persist in being childish, then I will ask Phyllis to stand also."

Phyllis rose, and the girls waited breathlessly.

"Come to my desk, please," Miss Baxter continued.

They obeyed her, Phyllis slipping her watch with its tell-tale initials into her pocket as she walked beside Janet to the front of the room and up to the desk that was raised on a small platform.

Miss Baxter surveyed them with grim determination as she might have a knotty problem in mathematics. She would not give heed to the small voice within her that counseled care. Miss' Baxter never gave heed to anything but her own faultless judgment.

"You," she said, pointing to Phyllis, "are Janet and you," -- she frowned at Janet -- "you. are Phyllis."

The twins did not reply. They stood before her in respectful silence.

"Now, Janet," -- not being contradicted, Miss Baxter continued with even more certainty -- " you, I believe, spoke." She looked at Phyllis.

"I was the one that spoke," Janet said quietly. "I said 'snow.' It is snowing, you know."

"We are not discussing the weather." Miss Baxter tried to silence the room with the weight of her scorn but she failed.

"Very well then, Phillis [sic], you may report to me after school." She prided herself that the interview had been most successful.

"Where, Miss Baxter?" Phyllis inquired.

Miss Baxter gasped.

"Janet, is it necessary for you to interrupt?"

"I wasn't interrupting," Janet protested.

Miss Baxter looked from one to the other of them and realized very slowly and very painfully that she had made a mistake.

"Go back to your seats," she said scornfully. "The matter is too trivial to discuss."

The twins did not smile; they merely walked backed to their seats and went on studying.

The bell rang not many minutes later.

"My Aunt Jane's poll parrot, was there ever such a scream. My sides ache." Sally hugged Janet in the excess of her delight.

"Look out for rocks ahead," Eleanor warned. "Old Ducky Lucky doesn't like to be laughed at."

"Bless you," Phyllis protested; "we didn't laugh at her, did we, Jan?"

"Certainly not. I'd never do anything so disrespectful," Janet replied. "We merely answered when we were spoken to."

"While Ducky Lucky thought you were answering for each other," -- Sally chuckled. "Oh, why didn't somebody give me a twin. I never realized the thrilling possibilities until now."

"I wish you'd put on your watch again, Phyl," Rosamond said. "I feel so foolish when I look at you sometimes. You're not really alike but I never can remember which is which."

Phyllis slipped her watch on, and all the girls sighed with relief.

Daphne joined the group.

"I offer my congratulations," she drawled. "Sort of a dual role you were playing. Old Ducky Lucky was more ducky lucky-ish than ever. I could hear her even from where I sit."

"Just why do you call her Ducky Lucky'? Janet inquired. "I've always wondered."

The girls turned to Sally.

"It's a long time ago," she began, "since christened her, but it had something to do with the way she said, 'Tut, tut'; her teeth, you know, aren't always tight and the effect sounded just like ducky lucky, and so I called her that. It's years ago, and of course they fit better now, but the name still sticks."

"Oh, Sally," -- Janet was convulsed -- "she did make a noise just like that to-day, only I didn't realize."

"But I did," -- Phyllis laughed -- "'and it was all I could do to keep from giggling."

"Thank goodness math. is the last period; perhaps she'll have time to forget," Janet said just as the bell rang.

"Don't count on it," Rosamond called over her shoulder as she went back to her desk. "Ducky Lucky never forgets."

But mathematics class was uneventful. Miss Baxter ignored the twins, much to their delight, for they did not have to answer a single question.

"Sally, you're coming home with us this afternoon, aren't you?" Janet called as the bell rang.

"Yes; can you wait a half a shake?" Sally replied. "I have to take a paper over to Miss Simmons, but I'll meet you on the steps."

"Snow! " -- Phyllis laughed as she and Janet waited for her a few minutes later -- " what a lot you were responsible for to-day. Jan, whatever possessed you to say that out loud?"

Janet shrugged her shoulders. "I don't know; I suppose I was just thinking out loud. I was awfully thrilled when I saw it anyway."

"Well I may be your twin," Phyllis mused, "but I don't pretend to understand you. We did have fun with Ducky Lucky, though, didn't we?"

"Yes, but she could have gotten beautifully even with us if she had wanted to, " -- Janet laughed.

"How?" Phyllis inquired, but Sally's appearance cut short the conversation before Janet had a chance to explain.

They walked home through the park, and Phyllis insisted upon going in to see Akbar. As they entered the lion house, a small body thrust itself upon her and shouted gleefully:

"I've found you at last! I know I would. Where have you been all this awful long time? I've looked for you every single day."

It was Donald, and Phyllis was delighted to see him. She introduced him to Sally and Janet, and then waited to hear what he would say.

Donald looked at her twin and then at her,

"Vers two of you," be said gravely.

"Oh, you darling!" Phyllis exclaimed. "Don't look so disturbed. We're only twins."

Donald did not reply, he was busy looking at them again.

"Do you think you could tell us apart?" Janet inquired.

He nodded solemnly.

"I fink I could," he replied, "because, you see, her eyes are like ve brownie's -- all soft and queer"  -- he smiled engagingly at Phyllis -- "but yours" -- he turned to Janet -- "have all kinds of funny little gold fings that make vem all shiny. But I couldn't tell you apart if you shut your eyes, I don't fink."

"Oh, Donald, you're a great boy!" Phyllis laughed.

"I think he's wonderful," Sally exclaimed, "and the most amazing part of it is, he's right, Janet has little golden flecks in the brown part of her eye and you haven't. What a way to tell you apart, but I promise not to tell."

"Well, not Ducky Lucky anyway," laughed Janet.

Donald's nurse came to look for him, and bore him off in spite of his protests.

Phyllis described her last meeting with him and confessed to Sally that it had been at his house that she had met Muriel's Chuck.

"Oh, by the way," Sally suddenly remembered, "Muriel is going to give a party. Quite an affair, I understand, and we are all going to be invited. I suppose that Mr. Chuck will be there and a lot of other boys; have you heard anything about it?"

Phyllis nodded; she and Muriel had forgotten their quarrel and were seemingly on good terms again, although Sally had taken the place in Phyllis's heart that Muriel had occupied the year before. With Janet, they made up what the rest of the girls called the jolly trio. Daphne occasionally joined them, much to Janet's delight, and many were the afternoons that they had spent together in the snuggery, a room that the twins had fitted up to suit their particular tastes at the top of the house.

They were on their way up to it to-day when Miss Carter heard them and came out of the drawing-room.

"Late for luncheon," she chided. "You will all be very ill if you are not careful. Were you kept in?" she questioned, laughing.

"No, Auntie Mogs. Phyl just decided she had to see Akbar," Janet explained.

"Well, I don't think that was very nice to you, Sally dear," Miss Carter protested. "Do hurry and eat your luncheon. I told Annie to keep it hot for you, and, oh, by the way, there are some letters for you on the hall table." She returned to the drawing-room where she was listening to the head of a new charity who was trying to secure her promise of support.

Janet dashed to the table and came back with the letters.

"Both alike and they're from town," she said as she opened hers.

"Muriel's invitations!" Phyllis exclaimed. "And, oh, Sally, do listen -- it's to be a masquerade." 

"What luck, oh, oh, why haven't I got a twin!" Sally wailed.

The discussion of costumes occupied the rest of the afternoon, and they must have reached a happy conclusion for Sally went home singing, and every time Phyllis and Janet looked at each other that evening they burst out laughing.

Continue to chapter 10