LAUGHING WINIFRED

New Zealand Tablet, Volume XXXVII, Issue 1, 7 January 1909, Page 37

LAUGHING WINIFRED

' Isn't it too funny ! ' Winifred leaned against the wall to have her laugh out. '■ I can't keep my face straight when she opens her mouth. - How in the world does she get her verbs mixed up in that queer way?' ' You know, she has been in this country but six months,' Pauline suggested gently. ' I think she speaks English very well when you take that into account.' ' Perhaps she does,' Winifred admitted carelessly. '.But anyway, it's fun to hear her. If I were her roommate, I shouldn't do a thing but laugh all day.' ' Don't let her know you are laughing at her,' warned the mbre thoughtful Pauline. ' Oh, she won't notice. She's the slow sort that never, notices things,' Winifred returned. ' And it's lucky sho is, or otherwise she'd be my mortal enemy.' She walKed away humming a tune, and it was not until supper that it occurred to her that there might be two sides to the question. The girls in Miss Graham's school who were studying languages did not look forward to their supper with unqualified anticipation. The girls who took German sat at ' the German table,' and were not supposed' to make any remarks during the meal, except in the language.' The French table was on the other side of the dining room, and at this the conversation was all in French. Winifred sat at the German table, and when she took her seat that night she found that the flaxen haired foreigner, whose accent had seemed so amusing earlier in the day, was her right-hand neighbor. •• Winifred's German vocabulary was' somewhat limited, and it was not till she had done some thinking that she ventured to ask her new. neighbor, Lena Saeker, how' she had employed her first day at the school. For a moment Lena stared, as if she had not quite understood. Then suddenly her fair cheeks flushed, and she hastily replied in smoothly-flowing German which fell musically on Winifred's ear, though she could not understand all the words. The teacher, Miss Roberts, spoke from the end of the table, when Lena had finished. ' We are very fortunate in having Lena with us,' she said in German. ' Her fine accent will be a great help to. Us' all.' And for" the., rest of the supper hour Lena had so many questions to answer that it was a wonder she found time to eat. t Nor was that all. As Winifred left the dining room she .heard an animated conversation going on between Miss Roberts, the German teacher, and Miss Wallace, who taught French. " ' Can't we make arrangements to divide that remarkable Lena?' Miss Wallace was asking eagerly. 'It isn't fair that you should have her all the time. You know, • she has an "excellent French accent, and she would be a real inspiration at my table.' Winifred did not hear Miss Roberts's answer. She was thinking how she had laughed that morning at the peculiarities^ of Lena's English accent, and the memory

made her uncomfortable. She could not help feeling that if Lena had not been too polite, she might have had her share of laughter that day.