Jennifer Gay

Jennifer Gay, at 16, has left school, and lives with her widower father in an expensive service-flat home in London with all the work done by the staff including cooking and serving meals, cleaning, and chauffeuring. She has entered for the Cargill Award, which provides a year's free tuition at Secretarial College in London. Her doctor father has been invited to attend a conference in the USA. But -- the Cargill Award is won by her friend Daphne, who couldn't otherwise have afforded to go -- and with it, Jennifer's first chance to do something for herself. Until she meets Mrs Miller, an old friend of her mother, who was involved in judging the award, and who suggests that she might instead attend a small secretarial college in the country. She accepts, even though her father still thinks it's the London college she is attending.