The Daring Game by Kit Pearson Page B

fastest slippers in the dorm, being both heavy and streamlined. Positioning it in the doorway, she sent the moccasin off with a strong push. It zipped down the hall and landed with a hollow thud at the other end.
    Carrie hopped eagerly in her own fluffy slippers. “Shall I start now?”
    â€œGo in bare feet, so you don’t slip,” said Eliza quickly. She shivered; the roof was steep and there was concrete below it.
    Carrie sat on the wide windowsill facing them, only her legs inside and her hands gripping the bottom of the half-open window. She tipped her head back: “I just have to get a hold on the gutter,” she called. Pulling herself up so they could see only her bottom half, she lifted one leg at a time onto the roof.
    Eliza’s heart beat in her ears as she leaned far out the adjacent window and watched Carrie scramble up until she disappeared. A squeal of alarm made her freeze; then she heard the sound of surprised laughter that meant Carrie had made it.
    They went back to bed and waited for her return. Eliza knew she wouldn’t have done it. Climbing trees was one thing, but this was much scarier. She wondered how her friend could be so brave. But Carrie never reflected about things; she just acted.
    She was gone a long time, and Eliza started daydreaming about the ballet. It had been a revelation to her, even though they’d sat so high up the dancers had resembled a company of tiny dolls. There was something about their precise movements and the way their bodies and feet told a story that was deeply satisfying.
    She tried to think of other things to take her mind off the dare. This morning they’d had Mark Reading. It seemed cruel, making everyone stand up in order as their marks were read out. But at least she had got mostly A’s and B+’s—with one B in French—and she was secretly triumphant that she’d beaten Pam slightly. Later in the morning Miss Clark had praised Eliza’s English exam. But then she’d read aloud with amusement her answer to a question about Tennyson’s poem “The Eagle”: “The main impression in this poem is the sense of great height as the duck stands on a high rock and waits to strike.”
    A duck! Wherever had the word come from? She hadn’t been thinking about ducks at all. She blushed violently, but the class’s laughter was appreciative, not mocking. Eliza decided that strange things happen when writing under pressure.
    Carrie and Jean had received respectable B’s, but Helen had been among the group who remained sitting, their marks undisclosed but below a C+. It was puzzling, how Helen rarely got her homework finished. The boarders had so much supervised prep that it was hard not to do it. In fact, Eliza had found that if she finished hers quickly she had time to sneak a book on top and read undisturbed.
    Helen certainly seemed smart. Pam had been rehearsing for the inter-house spelling bee one night, and Helen had known all the words. “Why don’t you enter it?” Carrie had asked her, but Helen had just replied it was too much trouble.
    But Eliza didn’t want to think about Helen.
    Jean yawned. “Where is Carrie?” It was very late; Pam’s eyes were closed, and Eliza would have liked to go to sleep herself.
    WHAP! The slipper landed against the wall and startled them awake again. It wasn’t Eliza’s slipper, but a scruffy blue one. That was one problem with the Slipper Express: people forgot to send back the same one and you often had to retrieve your own the next day.
    â€œArrived okay. Safe to return?” read the message Helen pulled out. She stepped into the hall, listened for a second, then sent back an all-clear.
    Suddenly they heard voices in the hall and froze. A few minutes later Carrie strolled through the door, calling over her shoulder, “Thank you, Miss Monaghan.”
    â€œWhat happened?”
    â€œDid you get