Allison felt her heart sink. The pounding in her head and the queasiness in her belly grew worse. There was something awful coming her way, she knew it.

"Oh?" she managed to squeak.

"People makes mistakes, Allison. And we're here to correct them, not to turn the transgressor out. You have made a mistake," Erika said, sucking in a deep breath and curling up her lips in another smile.

How Allison shivered under that smile! She could sense something was coming, something that would change her life forever.

"Maybe I just don't fit in here," Allison confessed, feeling her cheeks burning with shame and embarrassment. "The other girls… I mean," she went on hesitantly, not able to stare Erika in the face. "The other girls all come from wealthy families and I…"

"Nonsense!" Erika said, waving her hand in front of her face to dismiss the thought. "The other girls have as many problems as you do. I consider all my girls equal. You've transgressed, however, and must be punished. Your mother has spent a good deal of money to have you sent here, money I cannot return to her should you be expelled. Would you want that to happen?"

Allison bit down on her lip again, shaking her head from side to side.

"Very well," Erika said, standing up and moving from behind the desk. "Come with me."

She led Allison to the back of the building, through the massive kitchen where the cooks were preparing supper. The blonde teen suddenly realized she was hungry. She hadn't been eating much the past day, terrified that the headmistress would be calling her mother.

Again Allison thought of her mother and of the sacrifices she had gone through to send her here. No, no, Miss Vennestroom was right. She couldn't let her mother down. If she was going to be punished, all right, so be it. Surely the punishment wouldn't be that bad. In a few hours she would be back in her room with Janie, laughing and giggling over how strange Erika Vennestroom was and about how absolutely creepy this whole place was.