Go and wash them." The bad mark, whatever it might mean, appeared to me very unjust.

Had I known the rule, it would have been different, but how was I to know, when no one had told me?
"Please, ma'am, I didn't--" "Two bad marks for talking!" was my only reply, and off I slunk, feeling rather crushed, to the dormitory.
I found Flanagan scrubbing at our basin.
"Ah," said he, "I thought you'd get potted." "I think it's a shame," said I.
"Look-out, I say," exclaimed Flanagan, skipping away as if he'd been shot, and resuming his wash at the other basin.
Presently he came back on tip-toe, and whispered, "Why can't you talk lower, you young muff ?" "Surely she can't hear, here up stairs ?" "Can't she?
That's all you know! She hears every word you say all over the place, I tell you." I went on "hard all" at the nail-brush for a minute or so in much perplexity.
"Keep what you've got to say till you get outside.

Thank goodness, she's rheumatic or something, and we can open our mouths there.

I say," added he, looking critically at my hands, "you'd better give those nails of yours a cut, or you'll get potted again." I was grateful for this hint, and felt in my pocket for my knife.

In doing so I encountered the box of sweets Mrs Hudson had left in my hand yesterday, and which, amid other distractions, I had positively forgotten.